Killers Of The Flower Moon is hailed a ‘triumph’ by critics
Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon received a rapturous nine-minute standing ovation when it premiered Saturday night at the Cannes Film Festival.
And now that the first reviews for the three and a half hour epic are rolling in, it’s safe to say that the iconic director’s very first western will go down in the books as a ‘triumph’.
A wide range of film critics have already given the Leonardo DiCaprio-led movie five stars across the board, with one even calling it the best in its genre.
Words like ‘scorching’ and ‘masterpiece’ were used by critics who managed to get a ticket for the first screening.
IndieWire said DiCaprio gives “his best performance ever,” while The Guardian awarded five stars for a “remarkable epic about America’s bloody birth.”
Three times hooray! Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon received a rapturous nine-minute standing ovation when it premiered Saturday night at the Cannes Film Festival (pictured)
Smash hit: And as early reviews for the three and a half hour epic roll-in, it’s safe to say the iconic director’s first-ever Western will go down in the books as a ‘triumph’
There were some dissenting comments, with The Times calling it “a damp squib.”
Scorsese unveiled Killers of the Flower Moon at Cannes, the debut of a riveting American epic about greed and exploitation set on the gory plains of an Osage Nation reservation in 1920s Oklahoma.
Scorsese’s latest – starring DiCaprio, Lily Gladstone and Robert De Niro – is one of his most ambitious. It’s an adaptation of David Grann’s non-fiction bestseller, runs for nearly three and a half hours, and cost Apple $200 million to make.
Nothing was more anticipated at this year’s festival than Killers of the Flower Moon – a bitter crime film and a Great Plains Western – which seemed to live up to those expectations.
It earned a lengthy standing ovation and repeated cheers for Scorsese, 80, who premiered his first Cannes film since 1985’s After Hours.
Addressing the audience after the screening, he said, βWe shot this in Oklahoma a few years ago. It took a while, but Apple has done so well with us.β
The red carpet attracted a wide spectrum of stars. In addition to the film’s extensive cast, Apple CEO Tim Cook, along with actors Cate Blanchett, Salma Hayek, Paul Dano and Isabelle Huppert, were among those in attendance.
Reviews: Words like ‘scorching’ and ‘masterpiece’ were used by critics who managed to get a ticket to the first screening
While Grann’s book offers many possibilities for the story, Scorsese and co-writer Eric Roth focus their story on Ernest Burkhart (DiCaprio, in his seventh collaboration with Scorsese), a World War I veteran who falls for Mollie Brown (Gladstone) , the member of a wealthy Osage family.
The film stars DiCaprio alongside Scorsese’s other old muse De Niro, charting a spate of murders among oil-rich Osage Indians in the 1920s and the birth of the FBI.
It is DiCaprio’s first big screen movie since the 2019 Quentin Tarantino movie Once Upon A Time In Hollywood. He also starred in the 2021 movie Don’t Look Up, which was streamed on Netflix.
Set in the 1920s, it revolves around the FBI’s investigation into a series of murders after several members of the Osage tribe of Oklahoma were slaughtered.
Ouch! There were some dissenting comments, with The Times calling it “a damp squib.”
Killers of the Flower Moon focuses on a little-publicized chapter of American history involving the Osage Nation.
In the 1920s, the Osage tribe became wealthy almost overnight after oil was discovered under their land, bringing in more than $30 million in annual revenue at the height of the boom, according to the Oklahoma Historical Society.
Underground minerals within the Osage Nation reservation were tribal property and held in trust by the government.
Mineral leases provided royalties that were paid to the tribe as a whole – with each entitled party receiving an equal share, known as a headright.
But these headrights could only be obtained legally by outsiders if they married into the tribe.
It was at this time that farmer William K. Hale, a resident of Greenville, Texas, encouraged his submissive cousin Ernest Burkhart to marry Osage member Mollie Kyle (later Mollie Burkhart).
After hours of waiting in the rain that has drenched the French Riviera city all week, fans went wild when the trio arrived for the premiere along with several Native Americans in traditional outfits.
Story: Scorsese unveiled Killers of the Flower Moon at Cannes, debuting a riveting American epic about greed and exploitation on the bloody plains of an Osage Nation reservation in 1920s Oklahoma
Co-star Jesse Plemons arrived with wife Kirsten Dunst, while Salma Hayek, Cate Blanchett and Tobey Maguire also attended.
Based on a non-fiction bestseller, the film sees DiCaprio play a strong-willed man who marries a wealthy Osage Indian and becomes involved in the deadly schemes of his leading uncle (De Niro).
Killers of the Flower Moon screened out of competition at Cannes.
It is the first time that Scorsese, who won the Palme in 1976 for Taxi Driver, has presented a film here since 1985, although he was chairman of the jury in 1998.
It’s set to debut in select cinemas on October 6, with a wide release slated for October 20.