Those Who Wish Me Dead Doesn’t Care About Its Own Conspiracy — And That’s Refreshing
Sometimes it’s better to just skip to the fireworks
When the story of 21st century American cinema is written, Those Who Wish Me Dead will likely be a footnote to an appendix. It isn’t a particularly innovative film and it doesn’t pretend to be. If you told director Taylor Sheridan his movie felt like an old-school action/thriller you might have watched any Saturday teenage night… I think he would smile.
These days, there’s real value to a movie like that. I love Marvel and I think the current entertainment landscape’s as good as it’s ever been. But there’s something intrinsically nice about watching an out-of-fashion genre, especially in theaters.
Still, this isn’t a movie that inspires a lot of conversation. Despite featuring a forest fire, it’s uninterested in climate change — or any serious themes for that matter. After watching it, my family all agreed we liked it, we joked around about a couple of implausible plot points, and now it could easily never come up in conversation again.
But there’s one place where Those Who Wish Me Dead tried something fresher. Judging from the small sample of my family, this innovation had mixed reactions. But I personally loved it, and I think it’s worth…
