Plot Overview
The Oscar season has finally kicked off with the nationwide release of this magnificent epic. Although many great movies are expected to hit the theatres in the next two months, something tells me that only few will match the sheer brilliance and cinematic beauty of The Assassination of Jesse James. The movie opens in 1881, when Jesse (Brad Pitt) and his gang of outlaws have already achieved legendary status among the public. The gang consists of Jesse’s older brother Frank (Sam Shepard), their cousin Wood (Jeremy Renner), Charley Ford (Sam Rockwell), Ed (Garret Dillahunt) and Dick (Paul Schneider). The gang has only one robbery to go before calling it quits, however, things start to get complicated when Charley’s younger brother Robert (Casey Affleck) creeps up on the leader and asks to join. Although Jesse James is a brutal thief and murderer, he is also a supporting husband and father. At the movie’s focus is the obsessive and destructive relationship between these two men. Many will associate their bond with homosexual undertones, but the game of death they play is a strange, yet fascinating tale.

The Good
This is the sophomore feature of the New Zealand-born filmmaker Andrew Dominik. His first movie Chopper (2000) with Eric Bana was a solid effort that was mainly confined to the walls of a prison. With the free, unforgiving landscape of his new movie, however, Dominik has created an elaborate, brooding masterpiece that unexpectedly creeps up on you and lingers in your memory for a long time afterwards. What separates Dominik’s film from other similar movies in recent memory is the creation of the hypnotic, eerie portrait of the American West. The Assassination of Jesse James has an operatic scope, aided by the inventive narrative that also involves subtle and effective musical score, extraordinary cinematography by Roger Deakins, and gentle voice-over narration during which the frames are tainted with foggy, saturated colors, making the entire movie-going experience almost surreal and unforgettable. In addition, the performances are fierce and authentic, especially by Pitt, who has not been this commanding with a role in a while, and Affleck, who with his scary performance here and in Gone Baby Gone is emerging as one of the leading men of 2007. These two should be remembered at the end-of-the-year awards.

The Bad
At 160 minutes, The Assassination of Jesse James will challenge some viewers not to take a bathroom break. It is a slowly paced and quiet film that requires a certain amount of trust and patience from its audience, but it is a fully rewarding experience in the end.

Final Word
I’m not sure how many people The Assassination of Jesse James will reach while playing in theatres, but the movie paints a richly dense mosaic that gradually reveals itself as almost cinematic poetry. Apart from it being ambitious and haunting, the movie also makes a statement on today’s celebrity-obsessed culture. It is a skillful and confident examination of one of the most notorious killings in American history that emerges as an uncommon and valuable work of art.