Around Fall, Winter and the Christmas holiday, the award-winning movie season starts up as studios hope to release their best films in time for the Academy Awards. Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri is definitely one of them. Using the same mixture of thrill, emotion and comedy that he used in In Bruges and Seven Psychopaths, director Martin McDonagh recreates the distinctive blend he’s known for in his best and most agonizing piece yet.
Starring the always amazing Frances McDormand as a forceful woman without a nice thing to say about anyone. She is trying to get the police department on the path to solving her daughter’s murder by renting three billboards to shame them and call them out on their reluctance to take any action to solve the case. Though her pain is real and horrific, her portrayal of the character is humorous, as her blunt personality is used to soften the more serious underlined story. Every scene starring McDormand is filled with rude comments, directed at everyone, leaving no one safe from her insults or Molotov cocktails.
Both aiding and frustrating her, Sam Rockwell plays a bigot cop that steals every scene he’s in. In an Oscar-worthy performance, Rockwell proves once again that there isn’t a role he can’t conquer as he plays truly one of the angriest and stupidest men in Missouri with deep seeded self-esteem issues. Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri is a greeting letter to the emotion of anger exposing its consequences and the pain from which it’s born. Everyone in this film is angry one way or another, either at society, the police, their mothers, their husbands, their neighbors, etc. Anger is in everyone and it spreads like wildfire.
Frances McDormand, as Mildred, has lost her daughter and needs to blame someone to gain closure. She chooses the police department because they are the only ones available. There were no leads in her daughter’s case, causing it to go cold and put in the back drawer. Though the police aren’t the best in the world, there wasn’t much that they could do. No matter what they did, or could have done, she would have heaved the blame on them. Once her anger gets out there on three large billboards, for everyone to see, it starts to spread. Chaos erupts in Ebbing and it’s hard to contain. Fire lights up every start corner and violent threats are handed out person to person. One is even thrown from a window.
Spectacular performances and an ending that will make you wonder, it’s hard to look away from and will hold your attention. Unique with its own quirky flavor that will stay with you long after it ends, this is a true dark comedy and a must see.
