Tyrannosaur
opens with a drunken Peter Mullan kicking his dog and then carrying the pet
down the street to bury in his front lawn. It's a jolting, horrific scene that
elicited gasps of shock from the theatre and it's a perfect setup for the rest
of the film. Tyrannosaur sports some heavy brutality and bloodletting, as well
as a couple of rock solid performances from its leads. Like its main character, it is simultaneously
repulsive and intriguing.
If you didn't catch it before, Joseph
(Peter Mullan) is an alcoholic and could use some anger management classes. When he stumbles into a charity shop
after a breakdown reduces him to tears, Hannah (Olivia Colman) prays for him
and begins to melt away the chilly ice surrounding his frozen heart.
Well "¦ kinda. Joseph still feels
that urge to fight and tear apart when backed into a corner. That's one of the things I really liked
about Tyrannosaur: we don't get a life-changing
prayer from Hannah. Joseph
struggles with his violent tendencies long after he knows he needs to stop. Neither of these characters are saints,
but watching how both Joseph and Hannah handle situations that develop around
them is consistently enjoyable, dark as their circumstances are.
For a movie as bleak as this one,
the gravity of the major conflict has to be really powerful, though, and Tyrannosaur loses its footing here. The
big issue is Eddie Marsan, who appears miscast and out of place. Several scenes require him to really
terrify the audience and most of the time he just falls flat. A particularly pivotal scene that's
further illuminated later in the film is meant to really disgust and upset the
audience, but Marsan seems only half committed to it and the scene suffers as a
result.
Ultimately, Tyrannosaur is a
powerful film that I recommend. It's not for everyone, and not all of it works,
but there's a good story here and two really fantastic performances from Mullan
and Colman that deserve to be seen.
