Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)

Where to begin regarding Killers of the Flower Moon? It’s another awesome collaboration between Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro. As well as another for Martin Scorsese and Leonardo Dicaprio. This is the first film to have all three together. Although De Niro and Dicaprio have joined forces before on This Boy’s Life, a pretty high quality, intense coming-of-age story from 1993. De Niro had a hand in casting Dicaprio for that movie, helping get the young star’s career off the ground. This was roughly around the time of his Oscar-nominated performance in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.

This is Scorsese’s 27th motion picture, not counting his documentaries. And at 80, he’s hotter than ever.

Killers of the Flower Moon is something of an epic. I’m not sure if I would call it a Western. To me it’s more of a crime thriller, with a familiar cast of dirty, immoral characters that typically populate a Scorsese picture. Instead of the inner cities of New York or Boston however, we’re in rural Oklahoma during the 1920s.

Leonardo Dicaprio plays Ernest Burkhart, a war veteran returning home and looking for work from his Uncle, William Hale, played by Robert De Niro. Thanks mainly to oil, this is a very rich, prosperous time for the local Native American tribe the Osage. They wear expensive jewelry and drive fancy cars because all that in-demand ‘black gold’ is technically theirs to profit from.

Early on William Hale, an all-powerful figure, seems like a decent character. He speaks the native tongue and appears to have harmonious relationships with the Osage. It’s sort of an open secret that white men marry into the Native community in order to inherit their fortune. This is not the case with Ernest however. He meets Mollie (Lily Gladstone), an Osage, after picking her up for a ride. Early on, we believe that Ernest has real affections for Mollie and isn’t necessarily motivated by money or acquiring wealth. You truly believe that he, along with Hale, have the Native Americans’ best interests in mind.

Soon however, local Natives start showing up dead, with no clues as to who the murderer is. In an effort to track down those responsible, the Osage send a representative to Washington D.C. to make a plea to the US government to help find those responsible. They also hire a private detective. But corruption and conspiracy loom large over all of this. And Ernest finds himself wrapped up in a world of deceit, robbery and murder.

Flower Moon is 3 and a ½ hours long. Coming in second to Scorsese's longest feature, 2019’s The Irishman. While I thought this would be a challenge to my movie experience, I did not actually tire or lose interest at any point. That being said, I do believe this story could have been told in 2 hours.

Killers of the Flower Moon (2023) falls nothing short of a masterpiece. It is not within my personal experience to be completely captivated by a film for its entire 206 minute run time, but this film has made itself the exception. More often than not, films reaching over two and a half hours lose momentum and consequently viewers find themselves losing interest. Moon represents the unique case of keeping its audience engaged for its entirety while simultaneously foregoing excessive action and explicit romance. This is not to say that Moon does not dabble in shocking explosions or surprising murders, but it does so in such a tasteful way that it creates a flow of events that you can’t take your eyes off of. Cinema has moved into an age where every film includes implausible, over the top violence, graphic nudity or both and it is becoming overwhelmingly monotonous. Moon seems to be the first film in this genre to break that mold and prove that a good story and an excellent cast is all you need to keep your audience engaged.

Our main character, Ernest Burkhart is not a typical character that Leonardo DiCaprio plays. Ernest is slimy, cowardly, and childish but not in a way of being immature or throwing tantrums, but by being naive and easily manipulated. He is told what to do and does it, both to make sure that he stays in the good graces of his uncle, William Hale (Robert De Niro), but also because it is not within his capacity to do otherwise. When we are first introduced to Ernest, he speaks of how much he loves women and money and his goal to become wealthy. This goal of his definitely does not change when his uncle suggests he marry the reserved, beautiful, and uncoincidentally very rich Osage woman Mollie Burkhart (Lily Gladstone). Believing it to be his own idea, Ernest complies, eventually winning over Mollie and marrying her. However, the true work he does for his uncle does not cease. He is happy to rob rich Osages for their jewelry then go home to his Osage wife and pretend to be a loving, doting husband while being the reason their people suffer. William Hale, being the most powerful man in town, uses his influence to keep the money flowing to his pockets. All of his sons, nephews, and trusted employees have married into a rich Osage family, making sure that once these women have been murdered their fortune remains in the hands of conniving men.