Killers of the Flower Moon

  • Canada La Note américaine (plus)
Bande-annonce 15
États-Unis, 2023, 206 min

Résumés(1)

Au début du XXème siècle, le pétrole a apporté la fortune au peuple Osage qui, du jour au lendemain, est devenu l’un des plus riches du monde. La richesse de ces Amérindiens attire aussitôt la convoitise de Blancs peu recommandables qui intriguent, soutirent et volent autant d’argent Osage que possible avant de recourir au meurtre… (Paramount Pictures FR)

(plus)

Critiques (11)

POMO 

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français Encore un film rétro de Scorsese parfaitement mis en scène, avec des anti-héros pourris jusqu’à la moelle par la corruption et le mensonge. Et la tragédie des victimes, filmée avec la distance émotionnelle typique du réalisateur. Sauf dans le cas personnage principal, une femme indienne dont l’élimination ne se résume pas à une scène de quelques secondes impliquant une balle dans la tête. Il faut aimer le style narratif percutant de Scorsese. Moi, j’ai toujours eu un peu de mal avec ça. Robert De Niro prend un plaisir royal à incarner à nouveau un parrain manipulateur, cette fois-ci sous les traits d’un oncle sympathique. DiCaprio s’amuse à décliner toutes ses marques de fabrique en tant qu’acteur dans le rôle d’un personnage idiot et déchiré, à la bouche tirée vers le bas. Et Brendan Fraser brille dans un tout petit rôle. Par son jeu minimaliste et son regard hypnotique, Lily Gladstone est fragile, résignée et confiante. La très grande longueur du film soutient la complexité absolue d’une intrigue aux proportions épiques, mais elle augmente aussi le nombre de personnages et des événements qui les entourent, parmi lesquels j’étais déjà un peu perdu au moment du résumé final. Rythmiquement monotone, mais, grâce à une musique en pulsation constante, vivant et gradué de façon inquiétante, ce récit d’une injustice redoutable est revigoré par la survenue des agents d’un FBI à ses débuts, avec leur rigueur professionnelle. Les bandes de cinglés criminels de l’époque n’étaient pas habitués à de telles tactiques de maintien de l’ordre. Il y a une belle petite apparition surprise dans l’épilogue du film, monté avec solennité. C’est-à-dire, avec une solennité qui vise les nominations aux oscars. [Festival de Cannes] ()

Lima 

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anglais Here, more than with other films, you realize that even great filmmakers should have a producer's oversight, someone to tell them that such monstrous running time is untenable. Martin Scorsese's seminal works always flirted with three hours, but they had incredible pacing and were watchable in one breath. Here, I was hooked only with the arrival of the investigators and the final catharsis, which was powerful, so it took like two horus for things to get going, and I write this as someone who likes slow films and their gradual introduction to the plot. Nasty things happen, but I felt almost no tension and the bland monotone music didn't help. And someone should tell Leonardo DiCaprio that constantly crabbing his mouth into an inverted U is not a sign of good acting. So aside from the traditionally reliable Robert De Niro, I was only impressed with Lily Gladstone. Her quiet strength, soulful expression and engaging minimalist acting was something to behold. I wouldn't hesitate to call her the heart of the whole film, the one element of goodness in the human filth around her. I'm glad to see that similar artistically ambitious films are still being made in these bastardised, tik-tok times, but I'm afraid Marty won't be expanding his Oscar collection this time around. ()

Matty 

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anglais Martin Scorsese and Eric Roth have taken a muddled, mediocre book and turned it into a great American novel in film form. Killers of the Flower Moon is a monumental, multi-voiced and timeless chronicle of the fall of a community whose lust for wealth is stronger than love, even though its members are aware that they are preparing the next generation for the future through their own behaviour. The film is dark and slow and feels longer than The Irishman, for example, but that length is justified, as it makes it possible for us to gradually get into that community and see at first hand how greed and cynicism gradually and inevitably spread to the country, become entrenched and consume the characters. Throughout the film, we find ourselves in close proximity to a confident and seemingly all-powerful, yet essentially banal and sometimes comically obtuse evil whose proper punishment seems rather unlikely, which is exactly as frustrating and exhausting as Scorsese most likely intended it to be. By comparison, the voice of goodness is weakened by sickness and the “medicine” administered, and it is limited to naming the one who died (which is something of a Scorsese trademark). Despite that – and thanks to the dignity that Lily Gladstone radiates – it has a central, evidentiary role in the narrative. Killers is primarily an indictment of the murderers whose existence should ideally have been erased from American history (because many still profit from their crimes to this day) and an emphatic demand to give back a sense of humanity to those whose lives were reduced to a few thousand dollars decades ago; the director’s closing cameo leaves us in no doubt about this. ___ Scorsese directs his lament with the surehandedness of a master. This time, he economises on the spectacular dolly and Steadicam shots, instead relying on the actors and Thelma Schoonmaker’s feel for rhythm. As a message about the substance of American capitalism, his plunge into the darkness could eventually become an equally essential work as Giant (1956), Once Upon a Time in the West, The Godfather and There Will Be Blood. At the same time, the intense hopelessness and the atmosphere of irreversible decline reminded me of Tárr’s films. No, that won’t come easy in the cinemas for this proof that you can still make your magnum opus in your seventies. 90% ()

MrHlad 

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anglais The Osage nation has found oil in their territory and became rich. But where there is money, there are people who want to get their hands on it, and they will be going over dead bodies. Martin Scorsese delivers a dense drama about human envy, anger and cruelty that is not entirely audience-friendly and forces you to spend three and a half hours in the company of repulsive people. Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro give brilliant performances here, but the slow pace and a narrative that doesn't rush anywhere demand more attention and patience from the audience than usual. Scorsese is uncompromising, so be ready to do your fair share of time with his newest film. And he's certainly not going to make it easy. ()

DaViD´82 

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anglais Fargo 1920. It's not riveting, but it's undeniably excellent. It feels like a miniseries accidentally put on in one piece, two and a half hours of taking its time with everything in style, and in the final hour, after a change of style, it's conversely stilted. One of those films that should have either been considerably shorter (and left out entire lines) or, conversely, considerably longer (and fully committed to each). ()

JFL 

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anglais The American interpretation of the banality of evil, where “banality” is synonymous with the everyday and the ordinary, but it is not readily apparent. Scorsese needs these three and a half hours so that he can depict, with maximum disturbing effect, the paradoxes and absurdities in the actions of people who, with the support of institutionalised racism and under the banner of their own truths and idealised values, were able to live side by side with those whom they killed. Two aspects stand in opposition to each other. On one side, there is the mythology of a nation that is being corroded by adapting to an imported lifestyle, or rather to a foreign mythos of prosperity. The tragedy of the Osage consists in the fact that they tried to adapt to a foreign mythos, but from the perspective of the white outsiders, that mythos was (and still remains) meant only for themselves and not for anyone else. On the other side, we have a stubborn self-centredness underpinned by an imagined right to prosperity in a land of unlimited opportunities, which in practice means that it can be seized by any means at the expense of others. The narrative consistently makes us aware that evil does not consist in some sort of moral gymnastics that the individual uses to justify his or her opposition to good. On the contrary, the essence of evil consists in absolute rational ignorance with respect to anything foreign, including morality. Essential support for this is provided by the instilled roles, models and ideals that one has to fulfil, because the effort to fulfil them helps one not to see anything else. Fortunately, however, there is a third side, represented not by the local authorities, but by those of the state, which in Scorsese's typically idealistic vision are completely immune to the corruption and temptations of the world around them, because they are built specifically for the purpose of fighting evil. Thanks not only to the presence of DiCaprio, Killers of the Flower Moon is a reprise of The Wolf of Wall Street, in which Scorsese portrayed the perversity of egocentrism and opportunism so spectacularly that his film became a materialisation of the dreams of numerous assholes and a representation of what they should aspire to. This time, in the acting itself (from DiCaprio's clumsiness to DeNiro’s adaptation of Donald Trump’s facial expressions) and in the purposefully slow pacing, he deliberately takes care to ensure that his view of America’s values cannot in any way be misappropriated in the furtherance of those values, though the effort is ultimately futile, because nothing external will break the convinced racists and mammonists. ()

3DD!3 

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anglais Crushing. It’s good to see in the context of today's times when it appears that no one plays a fair game and those who do are suffering the most. It's not at all enjoyable to watch, in fact it can only be endured because of Scorsese’s masterful work with the actors and his obvious desire to tell an important story. De Niro and DiCaprio are both excellent, and Lily Gladstone is Oscar-worthy. Too bad the people who should see it won't be the ones who will, because they won't be comfortable with the company they'll spend those three and a half hours in, since the main characters are a lazy invalid slacker with a weak will, a naive (though mostly sick) rich wife, and an egomaniac convinced of the righteousness of his actions. The common denominator is, of course, money. Yeah, I like money, almost as much as I like my wife. ()

Kaka 

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anglais At first glance, the same symptoms The Irishman had. In his latest films, Scorsese is no longer able to escalate, or at least keep the pace of the story and thus the viewer engaged. Add to that the monstrous running time and we have a problem. Although Killers of the Flower Moon has unquestionable narrative value, an artistic signature and dramatic ambition, those 200 minutes were for the most part plodding, despite the fact that DiCaprio and De Niro literally give an acting tour-de-force. ()

D.Moore 

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anglais Ugh, so bleak, yet such a great movie. I applaud that Martin Scorsese didn't just decide to set the book in motion this time, as he unfortunately did in Shutter Island, but that he decided to retell the story in his own way, so that those who know the source material can get something out of it. It's not surprising that he conceived the film as a gangster drama, a chilling study of how easily a man can be swallowed by evil if he doesn't fight back, and an indictment of the media's silence on the subject. Perfect choice. And how it's filmed! The ideas, the cold murder scenes that only Scorsese can make, the wonderful mystical scenes I wouldn't have expected from him… And then there's the acting. Leonardo DiCaprio acts and looks like Marlon Brando, Robert De Niro straddles the line of caricature with clockwork precision and is clearly enjoying a proper role again, and Lily Gladstone, she matches them both with a single look that somehow manages to get everything into it. A true cinematic experience that deserves every one of those two hundred minutes. And with a perfect ending that few could afford. But Scorsese can. ()

Filmmaniak 

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français Un chant monumental et magistralement écrit, joué et réalisé sur le déclin de la société, qui plonge lentement et puissamment dans les ténèbres de l'histoire américaine controversée, en se concentrant sur l'essence du mal dans l'histoire des crimes cachés commis contre la population autochtone au nom de du désir de pouvoir et de richesse. Ce grand film se distingue par son ampleur, son échelle épique et son portrait précis des États-Unis, construit avec soin à partir d'un mélange de films de gangsters et de westerns, des genres américains fondés sur la problématique des comportements immoraux. ()

claudel 

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français Long, trop long, beaucoup trop long. Un élagage à 45-60 minutes n'aurait pas nui au film, certaines scènes auraient pu être évitées et l'histoire aurait gagné en dynamisme et en rythme. C'est une histoire triste et effrayante, certaines scènes m'ont fait mal à l'âme. Les performances des deux acteurs fétiches de Scorsese sont indiscutables ; Lily Gladstone, inconnue au bataillon, m'a également surpris. John Lithgow et Brendan Fraser, en revanche, auraient pu avoir un peu plus de place, ils l'auraient alors pleinement exploitée. Chapeau bas pour la musique dramatique qui soutient l'ensemble. ()