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In 2023, Robert Duvall plunges back into the limelight by both starring and crafting the story behind the movie, demonstrating his incredible skills as a writer and director with fresh tastes from Marvel movies. Duvall’s latest film is a uniquely captivating South Texan-style blend of family drama and murder mystery, two genres that do not fit together well, and while the film most certainly has its problems, it is still one of the best efforts of his career.
The story unfolds at first through a scene that is dimly lit and rapidly paced, making it hard to understand what is happening. Rancher Scott Briggs, played by Duvall, discovers his youngest son engaged in a lewd act with another boy so he throws them both out of the house into darkness and with constant cursing and fury claiming that they should read the bible.
Briggs is the same cussed sonuvabitch, but now it is fifteen years later. Funny enough, there are some key changes in his relative’s life. To start, a Texas Ranger by the name of Samantha Payne decides to reopen the question about the boy that was with Brenda’s other missing son.
The septuagenarian has decided that it is time to plan his estate which comes to calling for his son, Ben, whom he abandoned over a decade ago. When Ben returns to his childhood Ranch, he is as uncomfortable with his father’s presence as he gets with him. Fear, grief, and resentment on both sides make it clear that coming back to reconciliation isn’t easy. It will require more than just time.
Ben is met with a much warmer welcome by the rest of the people on the ranch. From KC’s perspective, teasing Ben over his sexuality is merely playful and a break from the responsibilities that came along with adopting the family lifestyle his father implemented. Though KC is not as close to his younger brother, he does relive the joy of watching one of his siblings and Ben’s age-mate having a family of their own. Ben also seems to enjoy reuniting with Maria, the Bautista family housekeeper who was there while he was growing up.
Duvall accurately captures the feel of Briggs’ rugged country, along with its activities and figures, and attempts to explain how these facets have shaped the head of the family’s character. On the one hand, Scott is a traditionalist a firm Biblical literalist, and a law-and-order conservative. On the other hand, he has enough of the Wild West spirit to take the law into his hands when it is convenient for him to do so.
This last tendency makes him shoot at illegal immigrants attempting to cross his ranch land into the U.S. It moreover drives him to take that step, which is rather uncharacteristic of him when he finds out that the woman Texas Ranger has decided to reopen a more-than-he-would-want forget case: He reaches out to a dirty cop he knows (Jim Parrack) and tells him to make sure that Payne is dealt with and stopped.
As soon as the drama begins, it’s easy to anticipate that it’s going to be a wild ride both good and bad. Most shocking, perhaps, is how the movie’s twin plot lines the murder inquiry and the grueling family get-together often seem to unfold in a very irrational manner and intersect in a very contrived manner. There are some self-evident gaps in the storyline, as well as some undramatic gaps that relate to the parts taken by Hartnett and Cepeda that intensify the movie’s semblance of hastily put together half truth.
Simultaneously, Duvall is an extraordinary actor who can make whatever he has created for himself work quite brilliantly. Scott Briggs is a complex, multi-dimensional, and constantly evolving individual who changes while considering his demise. Is he able to confront the demons he made during his life, or will he just add some more to the already dark book? Duvall, in almost every scene of the film, subtly and gently reveals details of the man to make him eerily alive, and as a result, unsettling. The result is that some very odd yet striking passages of drama are reduced to tears.
He works well with the other actors too, but the standout here is Franco. He does not shy away from adding another item to his Queer Studies portfolio but does so in a way that eschews cliché for wit, strength, and subtlety. The relationship between rancher dad and gay son is not only always at the emotional heart of Wild Horses, it is also the centerpiece of the film’s theme, and the work of two fine actors makes that disjunctive conjunction believable and memorable.
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