So we finally get around to this, the film that was considered to be badly snubbed at this year’s Oscars, garnering 12 nominations but winning only one for Jane Campion as best director. I think this is a fair accusation given how the actual winners were mostly such safe choices and this film can be interpreted as a direct attack on the archetype of the Western cowboy. I have my issues with how it seems so unbalanced in terms of character development but my wife and I had plenty to discuss about it afterwards and that’s always a sure sign of an interesting film.

Rose is a widow who runs an inn with the help of her son Peter. When two brothers Phil and George Burbank lead their cowboys on a cattle drive, they stop to eat there. Phil behaves rudely and is particularly harsh towards Peter who he considers effeminate. George tries to make amends and falls for her. They marry and Rose moves into the Burbank’s ranch while Peter goes to attend medical school but Phil continues to be antagonistic, accusing her of being after their family’s money. Phil’s hostility causes Rose to hide herself in her room and become an alcoholic. At the same time we see that Phil is probably a closeted homosexual. He speaks often of a deceased mentor Bronco Henry who taught him and Phil everything they know about being a cowboy and it is obvious that he is still in love with Bronco. When Peter arrives at the ranch for the summer, Phil changes his attitude and tries to take Peter under his wing.

It’s easy to see right from the start where the film is going with the character of Phil. He and the band of cowboys who work closely under him casually toss around slurs like faggot and nancy. They are deliberately cruel to Peter who likes to make flower arrangements out of paper and is bad at manly activities like riding. Yet Phil’s own homosexuality and comfort with naked male bodies are plain to see. It is more difficult to discern what is going on with the other characters. George seems kindly but also negligent in not intervening to help Rose and in putting her on the spot when she is uncomfortable with performing on the piano. Rose’s own total breakdown seems unexpected and it is unclear to me if she even loves George. Peter is revealed to have a dark side to him and he is a major character in the second half of the film, yet seems absent in the first half. The film is consistent in that Phil is really the main character but the development of the supporting feels very unbalanced. It’s weird how the film looks like it may be about the relationship between Phil and George at first and then George mostly absents himself after he is married with Rose.

It goes without saying that I’m down with this as a diatribe against toxic masculinity and it’s bold to insinuate that there is an inherently homoerotic side to cowboy culture. On the other hand, I kept expecting this to be a more subtle and insightful film than it actually is. It really just wants you to take things at face value, such that seeing the group of cowboys bathing nude together is enough to mean that they lean gay, and having Peter being ruthless is enough to mean that liking flowers doesn’t mean that you’re weak. So much more could be said about how Phil was once really so similar to Peter when he was young, being a brilliant student at Yale and clearly being talented in the arts yet the film is only interested in having him be the villain. Clearly it wants to frame Phil taking on Peter as his protégé as being insidious grooming but it’s seems wrong to condemn all kinds of male bonding of this kind. George’s total absence and Rose’s total inability to stand up to Phil are especially damaging to the plot in this regard as Phil takes on such an outsized role because they are so weak.

I went into this expecting to love it but in the end I found it to be okay but not truly great. The visuals are beautiful and the idea of mounting a frontal assault on the image of the Western cowboy is appealing. But the film misses the mark in terms of satisfying character development and I dislike how the story in the end turns out to be so plot-oriented. I understand that this is largely mandated as that’s out things play out in the novel that this was based on but this is just not the stuff that great cinema is made of.