Blood Country (2017) User Reviews

Should be titled "nothing happens in blood country".

[The_Devin_G · 4/10 · 18 March 2020]

This movie could have been good. The shots are beautiful, clothing and sets are convincing. The actors themselves are pretty convincing. But that's pretty much the best part of the entire movie. This movie suffers (and by that I mean is crippled) by the writing.

I still don't know what the story was supposed to be. Nothing ever gets concluded. This is a movie about a family fued that turned violent with almost no fued or violence at all. Honestly after the first 10 minutes you have seen the majority of the action in the movie. Also, there's tons of questions and open ended storyline. We have a murder that doesn't seem to fit right, like it almost feels like it could have veeb a frame job, an alleged murderer who doesn't act guilty. Multiple character paths that cross and trail off to nowhere. It's honestly just a huge mess and leaves you with more questions and very little understanding of what, happened.

None of the characters ever share feelings or act emotional at all except for a few seconds. This whole thing feels like a news article that got the outline of a story and never went deeper. There are so many scenes where it feels like we as the viewers missed out on something that happened, because we never see what motives the actions of the characters.

Honestly nothing hardly ever happens in this movie.You have a bunch of scenes where the characters don't do much, have a short conversation in which nothing happens, and then moves on to the next scene with the same thing. I was really hoping that there would be some sort of conclusion after the shootout and subsequent second arrest, (what I assume was supposed to be the rising action right before the climax of the film). But honestly, it fell flat and nothing at all was concluded.

Honestly, I'm irritated and frustrated that I wasted 2 hours watching a movie that somehow got awards, and I came out understanding less about the movie than I did when I went in after reading the short summary about it. Most westerns are really good at coming up with conclusions and wrapping up the story, or at the very least they have some nice shootouts, this doesn't ha e any of that. I'm considering looking for the book this was based on just so I can understand what actually happened.

Lack of context

[fmwongmd · 5/10 · 27 August 2018]

The lack of sufficient context makes it difficult to watch. There's a feeling that parts of the narrative are missing never mind trying to form an opinion as to guilt or innocence.

Very visual

[elcav300 · 6/10 · 3 January 2019]

A visually stunning movie about post Civil War Mississippi made in Mississippi on a shoestring budget. If you support film being made in Mississippi, this film is worth a look.

Confused

[colbreeze-73189 · 3/10 · 23 June 2018]

I'm sorry...but I did really like this movie. I just can't figure out what the story is. In fact, I came to this site to see if somebody could explain it to me. Unfortunately, nobody else seems to understand what happened either.

There are just too many pieces missing in this movie. I like the sheriff...he's definitely a good guy who tries to do his best. I loved his feisty wife! The Black family situation made me angry, I never did understand what was happening with ...shoot, almost everybody. I just wish I understood the story.

One last thing; I looked for a book to read that maybe this movie may have been taken from, hoping to make some sense of this film but there doesn't seem to be one...at least not one that I could find. There must be someone out there who knows what this movie is about. Share it with us, please!

Slow; boring; disjointed

[jtschroeder44 · 2/10 · 28 May 2018]

This previously highly-rated mess was boring. The story was disjointed. The character development was predictably puerile. The cinematic cutaways, apparently intended to add gravitas to an otherwise weak cinematic effort, instead distracted from any chance of an interesting plot development. Good that it ended in such short order. Save your time. Not worth a look.

"Who dis?"

[vashlyn-17615 · 3 May 2018]

This movie has made me realize that a man will kill over a head of cabbage. Not the best two hours of my life.

A dull meandering mess

[punisherversion1 · 1/10 · 11 April 2018]

Blood Country: Written and directed by Travis Mills

Let me try to see if I can surmise exactly what this movie was about because honestly I have no clue. It introduces characters and then they leave with no rhyme or reason. It has this blood feud at the core of its story that seems to have started over cabbage. This movie is only 89 minutes long but it could have benefited from more time spent on the characters or the story. The pacing is dry and very, very slow. This film was just so boring. It shouldn't have been.

This was a meandering mess. It creaked along at a very slow pace throwing random characters into the proceedings developing none of them along the the way. I'm ragging on this indie film a bit much so let me state some things that were good about it.

It is a beautifully made film. The shot composition is extraordinarily well done and I enjoyed the technical work in that department.

This is where the compliments end I'm afraid. None of the cast is given much to do. Most of them stare off pensively in the distance. We gather no insight into what they're thinking or feeling. A narrator shows up about halfway in the film to tell us what is happening and it still is not enough.

We needed this narrator in the beginning to set it up. It catches the audience offguard when it happens. The action beats that periodically pop up are fairly languid as well. By the time the big chase happens for the fugitive cabbage murdering guy, it's not enough to wake people up. This might have been going for an art film western approach but it failed dramatically. It is a snooze fest.

I give this movie an F.

Who dunnit?

[adamssteve-54011 · 2/10 · 10 June 2018]

I still don't get who did what to whom?

I like the movie-craft, but spent the whole time watching trying to figure out whether the primary (but, not the sheriff) did it or what? Or, was there some framing going on... but by whom? I came here because I was searching the web to find out if somebody else got it. Maybe there was more clarity in the book.

I hope somebody who saw this lets me know.

Slow as a Mississippi Drawl

[dave397 · 2/10 · 23 June 2018]

The school quality actors who deliver the dialogue in this epic tale almost succeed in turning a dismal period of U.S. history into comedy as they converse with each other. Watch it the next time you are dealing with insomnia. It might just become your favorite sleep aid.

He was definitely guilty

[haymarisela · 6/10 · 29 September 2020]

Not sure why people had issues with not enough evidence of innocence or guilt. It was pretty obvious to me and the resulting actions afterwards were of a guilty and vengeful man. It made it easier to imagine he'd kill his own kin .

Frankly I'd rather see a pile of mud...

[zachkehoe · 1/10 · 22 February 2020]

Was this made by a high school student? This was by far the absolute worst movie I have ever seen. The plot did not hold together at all, and there was no character development whatsoever. Each scene was boring and listless. There was no contrast within scenes, each being the same length. Start scene, have dialogue, end scene. There were zero establishing shots, instead leaving the audience to guess where each scene took place, only to completely change settings once we figured it out. Halfway through the movie they threw in a narrator, confusing us even more. To add to all this confusion, each actor delivered their lines like a middle school student forced to read at the front of the class. Some scenes were just actors pensively looking off into the distance, as if to convey some deep emotional moment that none of the audience knew about. They didn't explain most of the characters, not even mentioning some of their names. One actress even had eyeliner on - very realistic for a post-Civil War era. It almost seemed as if the director had never even heard of the concept of a second or third take. It boggles my mind to wonder how this movie got green lit. Honestly the best part of the movie was the lighting. What might a man do...to try to understand this movie???

A low budget gem.

[cmackeyclark · 8/10 · 21 November 2017]

Great to see other talented actors for a change; superstars can become cloying after a point. Also didn't miss miss overacting and the usual hype of Hollywood fare. The narrative did not convey artifice, nor did the actors. On the whole, a brisk Southern wind ripping raw through this gripping take on Faulkner's world.

Terrible "western"

[joelashley-704-631621 · 2/10 · 22 July 2018]

Some of the acting was acceptable, but most was like from acting school flunkouts. There were strange, exceedingly long pauses where the viewer's time is wasted and the actor is just staring and apparently in some sort of deep thought, or just brain dead.

Most aggravating was the insecure audio that was all over the map. The interior scenes had such strong, loud echoes that we had to turn the amp down to "40" whereas the standard setting is "12" (higher numbers = louder), and the echo affect and contrived accents meant we couldn't understand 30% of the words, so we had to use captioning. Outside scenes often required resetting the volume back toward "16", but the audio screw up in this movie is pervasive, with odd echo effects even lingering in those.

Why Was This Movie Made?

[kcterrell-25046 · 3/10 · 2 December 2018]

It's hard to understand why someone in Hollywood decided to adopt this novel in to a film. There is no plot or story to be told. Brother kills brother and for over one hour the film is about bringing him in for justice. (No 3:10 to Yuma, either). Then the end takes an incomprehensible supposed non-twist, just confusing and flies off the end of any serious story-telling.

The acting is credible for a a TV job. Cotton Yancey does his best Robert Duvall impersonation, and Richard Harris is awfully good in his brief role. But, in fact, the entire film feels like a made-for-TV movie. Absolutely no reason to see this movie on a big screen.

Amazingly, Hollywood put some real money into this production. They hired a seriously talented wardrobe, lighting and makeup crew, and excellent cameramen, to tell a bad (non) story. It's just sort of mind boggling.

The direction ruins any attempt to tell a story or to capture the imagination. It's a USC graduate school directing piece. Episodic trite and completely stupid shots - hokey bit after hokey bit by a director who clearly believes he's the next Orson Welles. And whatever is the self-baptism by Yancy about at the end? Allegory without any substance.

So, there's the good and bad of it. Bored? Go ahead and watch it, but you'll be left disappointed and scratching your head about whatever it is that you just watched.

Captures the feel of Post Civil War Mississippi

[coffmanslaw · 9/10 · 15 April 2018]

This Travis Mills film truly captures the reserved almost stoic mannerisms of the people of Post Civil War Mississippi. It tells the story of a feud between two brothers after one took the "wrong" side in the Civil War. Cotton Yancey is excellent as the conflicted, pressed into service, sheriff who just wants to do the right thing in dealing with the feud's aftermath. It's my kind of movie.

DANG GOOD MOVIE

[stephaniedavisholmes-16555 · 10/10 · 12 June 2018]

Independent western film that is true to the era and story filmed in. Amazing cast and crew, we love this film, especially Bart!

This is a damn good film

[coinneach-51982 · 8/10 · 28 September 2020]

Ok, idiots who gave this movie a bad review. I'm Ken Jennings. Not the JEOPARDY guy. The guy who did SWEENEY TODD on Broadway. And won 2 awards for my performance in that show. And I did many other Broadway shows. Film. TV. Commercials. Video games. Voiceovers. I've put food on my table and paid my bills as a professional actor for 54 years now. I never review anything. Don't use Facebook, Instagram. Though I have accounts with both. I'm a real pro, as pro as it gets. And this is a damn good film. Yeah, it's a bit slow. I think that's a directorial choice. It adds to the tension. Watch this. It's very good.

Good Story, Good Quality Film

[littlesummerstorm · 10/10 · 2 August 2021]

The Film Work is good quality! Will watch again to take in all the nuances once again! For all that is confused about the ending the black man at end knew Joe's name because it was like crossing the river styx! Very talented filmmaker and I see successful future for him!