Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
the peg of the story -- a woman countering slack police probe into her daughter's rape and murder through stinging questions mounted on billboards -- is powerful. but it does veer a lot and by the end of the film, when the mother and her unlikely associate set out for their own kind of vengeance, the story is not about the victim anymore. the makers, probably, wanted it this way; they've used the rape-murder as something incidental, a plot point to explore the inner workings of people in the little town the dead girl lived in. the film traces racism, police brutality and even sexual violence in a chillingly detached manner. in a more conventional film, this would've been about the mother, Mildred (a terrific Frances McDormand) building all that anger up and finding a release and NOT ending up a flawed avenger who is also weighed down by guilt. I felt that at times, the realism came at the cost of intensity. Sam Rockwell as the cop finding himself amid all the hate and bitterness is first-rate. and it's always, always, a pleasure to watch Woody Harrelson. not quite the one which the awards and accolades prepared me for but still, a very good watch.
3/5