Martin Scorsese’s epic crime thriller Killers of the Flower Moon has been generating Oscars buzz since it first premiered at Cannes in May this year - and now it’s finally set to arrive in theatres in New Zealand ahead of landing on Apple TV+.
It hasn’t been marketed or advertised to the same extent as recent box office giants Oppenheimer and Barbie, and New Zealand showings seem to be limited.
That might be down to the film’s 206-minute runtime or the fact that it’s been released at the same time as Taylor Swift’s Eras tour concert film. But despite the fact that it’s destined for streaming, this film needs to be seen on the big screen.
Robert De Niro stars in Killers of the Flower Moon as the villainous Bill Hale. Photo / Apple TV+
It’s based on David Grann’s 2017 book Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI, and tackles the systematic killing of the Osage people in 1920s Oklahoma, all over the precious oil found beneath their land.
It’s 1919, World War I has ended and countless Americans are starting to rebuild their lives and adjust to a new era. But in oil country, it’s the Native Americans who are the most well-off. At that time, the Osage were the richest people in the world per capita.
As seen in the film’s joyful and vibrant opening montages, they’re the ones spending up large on clothes and jewels and being driven around by white chauffeurs. But in stark contrast, they’re also dying one by one under mysterious circumstances.
It’s to this world that former army cook Ernest Burkhart (Leonardo DiCaprio) returns, seeking his fortune.
JaNae Collins, Lily Gladstone, Cara Jade Myers and Jillian Dion in Killers of the Flower Moon. Photo / Apple TV+
He’s welcomed home by his uncle Bill Hale (Robert De Niro), a wealthy cattle rancher living on the Oklahoma reservation who paints himself as a benevolent ally to the Osage.
He has a business pitch for his nephew, which he explains within minutes of his arrival. How would he feel about marrying an Osage woman? Take Mollie Kyle (Lily Gladstone, herself of Blackfeet and Nimíipuu heritage - and you may recognise her from Taika Waititi’s Reservation Dogs) for example. If he married her, he would gain her “headrights” or ownership of the valuable oil deposits on her family’s land.
It takes a minute for it to dawn on him what his uncle is really asking of him. He gets to know Mollie while driving her around town, and convinces himself that he’s falling for her without an ulterior motive. It’s not long before she figures out what he’s after - but at the same time, she finds herself falling for him, likening him to a coyote.
Ernest falls in love with her, but he’s more in love with money. Before long, he’s drawn into his uncle’s tangled web and is actively helping to arrange the deaths of several of his new wife’s family members. Mollie buries her mother and her sisters one by one, with Ernest and their children by her side.
Ernest and Mollie quickly fall in love - but he has an ulterior motive. Photo / Apple TV+
Mollie herself has diabetes and is getting sicker. Doctors prescribe the newfangled insulin injections, but it’s Ernest who administers them - along with a drop or two of something else, at the direction of his uncle.
In this sense there’s no mystery here at all - viewers can see exactly what’s going on, and can’t look away. What looks and acts like a Western is in reality a long-drawn-out tragedy with moments of dark humour, made more sickening to watch by the fact that this all happened in not-too-recent, but seemingly forgotten, history.
In its early stages, the film was initially centred around the creation of the Bureau of Investigation, now known at the FBI. But two years after Scorsese started writing the script, DiCaprio questioned that approach - so they reworked it to focus on Mollie’s story instead, and on her betrayal at the hands of the man who claims to love her.
It’s not until much later in the movie that investigators (including special agent Tom White, played by Jesse Plemons) arrive on the scene and begin untangling what has unfolded.
As someone who typically has a short attention span when it comes to movies, I expected to leave the theatre thinking that it really could have been a mini-series instead, but I didn’t. Long as it is, the film’s pace never slows as it builds to an eventual reckoning. The making of the movie itself, on location in Oklahoma and in careful consultation with the Osage themselves, also feels like a reckoning - one that’s long overdue.
There’s already speculation that the film will land De Niro an Oscar nomination, but it’s not really his character’s story after all. It’s Gladstone who is the emotional centre of the film, anchoring a story that will stay with you long after the credits roll.
