I described this to my wife as a cowboy film and indeed though it’s set in the 2010s, it feels like one. This is the first film I’ve seen directed by David Mackenzie and it’s one of those strange twists that he is British and not American. Yet there’s no doubt that this film succeeds brilliantly in revitalizing the Western genre and showing a path to making it work in the modern era.

Toby and Tanner are two brothers who embark on a spree of bank robberies in West Texas. Under Toby, the younger brother’s direction, this is a carefully planned series of heists. They target only the branches of one particular bank in small, quiet towns. They take only loose cash. Plus they try to avoid violence but this is made difficult by the wilder Tanner. They have a specific target amount of money to obtain and launder the money by crossing state borders to an Indian casino to exchange them into chips and then cashing them out with a cheque later. With their crimes not being serious enough to warrant the attentions of the FBI, it is left to two Texas Rangers to hunt for them. They are Marcus Hamilton who is on the verge of retirement and his partner Alberto Parker who is of mixed Native American and Mexican heritage. Marcus is able to see the pattern in their robberies and guesses where they will strike next.

This is a compact, intelligent film that does almost everything right. The brothers’ plan is smart though it stretches credibility a bit that someone of Toby’s background could have come up with it. The acting all around is great, the music by Nick Cave sets up the mood, and most of all, I love how everything follows the beats and tropes of old-fashioned Westerns but updates them to modern times. So when Toby and Tanner walk into a casino after a robbery, it parallels who robbers would relax in a bar. When they accidentally target a bank that is busier than usual, the townsfolk take up arms to fight back and form an impromptu posse to chase them down, just like in the old movies. Even the fact that the lawmen who hunt them are Texas Rangers is a deliberate affectation. At the same time, the film is also savvy enough to recognize its anachronisms. When the brothers start their spree of bank robberies for example, everyone reacts with disbelief that anyone would be dumb enough to rob banks in this day and age and live enough to enjoy the money. The backdrop works too. It’s set in a Texas where the economy is failing, everyone is saddled with debts and so even though robbing banks is wrong, there is some sympathy for hitting back against the finance guys who are ruining everyone. It’s not quite a realistic reflection of the real world but it works very well within the context of the film.

I do think it gets a bit off the rails towards the end. I get that Tanner is more willing to resort to violence but wanting to actually kill people seems like a stretch. It feels to me more that they wanted a more dramatic climax for the film and so had him go off the leash at the end. Another flaw is that in the old time Westerns, the lawman and the bandit usually know exactly who each other are and so there is more scope for them interacting with one another. This film has Toby and Tanner playing off of each other while Marcus has all of his scenes with Alberto. The structure of the film is such that Toby and Marcus have no scene together until the very end, which makes it feel a little lacking.

But these are minor quibbles in what is undoubtedly a very well crafted and balanced film. I note that the screenplay for this was written by Taylor Sheridan who would later direct Wind River. I didn’t really like that one but I can see the similarities in them being thrillers set in a very specific milieu featuring characters who are close to the land.