Lawless - Die Gesetzlosen

Lawless is the story of the three Bondurant brothers from Franklin County, Virginia, Tom Hardy, Jason Clarke, and the runt of the litter Shia LaBoeuf. Before World War I the Bondurants made a good living selling moonshine, but now Prohibition has arrived and there are new problems on the horizon for those in that business.

One of the most colossal pieces of stupidity that America ever indulged in was Prohibition. We actually amended our constitution so that we could regulate morals. A good lesson for those who think regulation of one's personal behavior is a desired thing. What the Bondurants have to deal with is law enforcement which is in the form of a corrupt District Attorney Tim Tolin.

An idea like Prohibition is sure to bring out the corruption in many who see it as a way to take bribes. Tolin is one of those and he has a special deputy in Guy Pearce ready to enforce the law and those who don't bribe. That would be the Bondurants and we have the makings of an old fashioned mountain feud brewing.

LaBoeuf has a lot of trouble living up to the legend his brothers have created. In fact his weakness is the cause of a lot of problems. But when a young mountain kid Dane DeHaan is murdered by Pearce that gets a war started.

Both LaBoeuf and Pearce deliver some standout performances in Lawless. This is based on a novelization of some real incidents by a descendant of the Bondurant family. The recreation of Prohbition era rural Virginia is well done. Definitely worth a look.

Reading the other reviews, I'm amused by the number of reviewers who don't have a clue about how southern rural hill people behave (and esp. behaved back in the 1920s). They accuse Hardy, and to some extent LaBeouf, of bad acting because their characters are so laconic (that means they don't run off at the mouth a lot) and inward and don't wear every emotion on their sleeves. Then they mightily praise Oldman and Pearce for great acting when they were, in fact, just playing northern urban gangsters who like to behave over the top---the very thing that disgusts southern sensibilities.

The folks making those review comments have probably spent too much time watching movies based on comic books and not enough time with dramatic characters representing actual human beings. So don't pay attention to their noise.

Instead, watch the flick. It's good. I enjoyed it.

Lawless was extremely well filmed, looked great and stayed true to year it was set in. The cast was strong and all delivered good performances, especially Tom Hardy, who once again showed how much of a versatile actor he is. Shia LaBeouf was also a stand out performer for me.

The plot is simple but easy to follow. There are some extremely gruesome scenes and some bits of good gun action. Apart from a few scenes, the film was pretty much just dialouge. There wasn't much going on really. It was a decent film but ultimately it is something that I won't remember in a few weeks. I can see why some have rated it so highly, I guess this just isn't the sort of thing I normally like. It was good but I wouldn't watch it again.

7/10.

'Lawless' is definitely a great film but there's something missing.

The acting is really strong; Tom Hardy's performance is probably his best so far. His voice is so different to his normal voice which really highlights how he has worked hard on his performance. I was really surprised by Shia LaBeouf's performance, he's never really impressed me but he gave a great performance here. He really proved that he could do some proper acting in the future and hopefully move away from the 'Transformers' series. Mia Wasikowska and Jessica Chastain both perform well but their roles are wasted here. They have no real purpose in the film and are merely there as love interests. It wouldn't have been such an issue if they had gotten any actress for these roles but they instead chose two of the best rising stars with huge amounts of talent. Guy Pierce is outstanding here but his role becomes almost comical towards the end. He gives a great performance though and is quite disturbing. Gary Oldman gives a really good performance but has only 5 minutes screen time! It seems like such a waste, it would have been interesting to see his character included in the plot a lot more.

Overall this film was fantastic but there was a few things that director John Hillcoat could have improved that would have made this film truly brilliant, such as giving more characters some crucial screen time. The violence was not really an issue; I don't think it diverted the film away from anything which is good. It contained the right amount of violence for the film and shouldn't put anyone off from watching this.

This film was very well done in giving us that 1920s vibe when alcohol was prohibited during that time. Be aware that it is very intense and quite gory in some scenes so it's definitely not for the fainted heart!