werefox08 The Proposition... a 2005 Australian / U.K. collaboration is a really very good movie . It is unforgiving in its relentless negative assertions of the human being.. It washes away the clean suppositions of the American "wild west", as told by great American movie directors over many decades. This is the real...TRUE GRIT... , a film that dares you to assume this couldn't have happened. O.K....its in the Australian Outback, but men are men...and when they are free to behave like savages...they will.(It is about survival too) It requires more than one viewing (all great movies do),if you can stand to see again--- the horror that lurks in all of the human psyche... its here for all to see. Ray Winstone (Captain Stanley) is brought from England to "clean up" a particularly nasty family of murderous thugs...the Burns Family. He is a tactical policeman who puts a daring operation into motion. He expects Charlie (Guy Pearce) to kill his brother Arthur (Danny Huston). The scheme is put into jeopardy by the poor judgement of the Judiciary. From that point...anything can (and does) happen. There are violent scenes here...But this is a small town in the Australian Outback in 1890. Violence was not.....un-common. This an above average Australian ("Western")..........Watch IT....!!!

Theo Robertson Captain Stanley captures two notorious outlaw brothers Charlie and Mickey Burns . He makes a proposal to Charlie . If Charlie goes and kills the leader of their gang Arthur Burns and brings his body back they will be given an amnesty . If not Mickey will be hung on Christmas day which is nine days away You always know what you're going to get with a film by Australian director John Hillcoat namely strong memorable drama that's best viewed with a ready supply of anti-depressants . You also know what you're not going to get , laughs , mirth and a strong narrative drive . Certainly both GHOSTS OF THE CIVIL DEAD and THE ROAD suffered slightly from a lack of a strong narrative drive and in this British produced pseudo Western set in 19th Century Australia there's also a sign of this flaw from the director The premise is one that grabs you and leads you to ask what you would do in that situation but as soon as Charlie leaves town on his quest the story meanders slightly as we're shown lots of panoramas of the Australian outback with a vague mystical air which will remind you of Australian cinema of the 1970s where the landscapes were the stars of the movie . One also gets the feeling in the first third that you're might be watching an Aussie version of APOCALYPSE NOW where a man with a mission involving extreme prejudice finds his target building an empire amongst the natives This doesn't happen thankfully and after a slightly unfocused first 40 minutes the story gets back on track with characterisation coming to the fore . THE PROPOSITION is much more character driven than the premise promises . There is a slight cop out in that Mickey is the poor unintelligent younger brother who has merely tagged along with the gang through family peer pressure and while Arthur isn't portrayed by Danny Huston as a stock psychotic villain with staring eyes and manic laugh his actions do more than enough to convince the audience that this rabid criminal dog needs to be put out of his misery . The characterisation between the good younger brother and the violent bad older brother could been written and developed as a bit more grey but there again it might have made it more difficult to cheer on Charlie the middle brother played by Guy Pearce The cast are excellent and special mention goes to Ray Winstone who is a national institution in Britain and watching him here you're aware of how underrated he is and gives a depth to Captain Stanley a man tormented by trying to uphold the law without giving in to rough justice from the locals . It's perhaps difficult to believe a rough working class bloke would be married to Emily Watson's rather middle class Martha but Watson does manage to project an innocence that seems out of place but that's undoubtedly the point . One character that did puzzle me was Jellon Lamb . John Hurt of course steals the show every scene he appears in but is there any point to the character except to spout Darwin ? it's a slightly confused and unnecessary character And THE PROPOSITION is a slightly confused film that stops it from attaining true classic status . It's a bleak nihilistic character study from John Hillcoat and contains all the strengths and weaknesses from the director's prior and future work . That said it's much better than most of the films the UK Film Council insist on wasting their money on from the same period

Dark Jedi Well, no matter how I rate this movie a lot of people are going to say that my rating is wrong. That is something that you probably can say about any rating for any movie. I feel it is especially true as far as this movie goes though. As you can see from my rating I was not exactly thrilled by the movie. That does not mean that it is a bad movie. Again, this you can say about a lot of ratings, especially my ratings.Okay, I guess I have confused everyone enough now so let me try to explain. As a piece of cinematic art this movie is excellent. The acting is quite good. I especially liked John Hurt as the literate bounty hunter but most of the main characters where performing admirably. The scenery is wonderful. The Australian outback makes for a excellent backdrop and it is indeed a nice change from the classical North American western sceneries.As a movie it falls flat though. In my opinion a movie should at least try to tell a story. Even if it aspires to be a piece of art it should try and tell a story that the audience can, in one way or another, follow. This movie have a basic idea of a story but it does not really tell a story. We never get to now who the bad guys really are, what they really did, except for a bunch of hints about killing and rape, or why. Heck, we never actually get to know of the guy the flogged to death where really taking part in the deed or not.Throughout the movie the bad guys are supposedly hiding in some place where it is impossible to get them so the main character tries to get the bad guys brother to kill him. Not very plausible at all. The governor, Eden Fletcher played by David Wenham, or whatever he as supposed to be was pretty much an asshole. Okay every movie has to have one but his role was never really developed. Once he managed to get the young kid, innocent or not, flogged we really do not see much of him for the rest of the movie.The end of the movie is much the same as the rest of the movie. Cinematically excellent but not much of a story. There is no real conclusion. It just ends in a sequence of well done scenes but without any real story behind it.Maybe I'm a too simple mind when it comes to these kind of movies but I, even though I appreciated the graphics that was shown on my TV-screen, I did not really enjoy it as a movie.

Wuchak 2005's "The Proposition" is a Western that takes place in Australia, and it's far from a typical Western.THE PLOT: Captain Stanley (Ray Winstone) is the new lawman of the territory and he's determined to civilize this brutal wasteland. In his way is a band of outlaws comprised of three brothers and a few others, but two of the brothers want out after the leader, Arthur Burns (Danny Huston), savagely murders a family in one of his raids. The two brothers are apprehended by Capt. Stanley, who offers a proposition to the older of the two, Charlie Burns (Guy Pearce): Find and assassinate the leader and both will go free. Charlie agrees to the assignment to save his little brother, not to mention he believes Arthur crossed the line when he killed the innocent family, which included a wife with child. Plus Charlie seeks redemption.As far as filmmaking, cinematography, actors, locations, soundtrack & editing go this is a top-of-the-line film with a surreal, haunting edge. As my title blurb suggests, there are similarities to "Heart of Darkness" and the original "Apocalypse Now," although it fails to achieve the greatness of the latter.The story plays out in a realistic manner with long stretches of drama and bleak landscapes interspersed with flashes of extreme violence. Ray Winstone and Guy Pearce are great as the two main protagonists. Capt. Stanley understandably wants to rid the land of the brute outlaws, whereas Charlie seeks redemption for himself and his little brother. Danny Huston as Arthur Burns is captivating as the focal point and villain. Yet he's not a villain in the clichéd sense and he's not one-dimensional. He loves the beauty of God's creation, he loves the art of language and he's a mystic of sorts, but he clearly crossed the line at some point in his outlaw endeavors and now must be wiped off the face of the planet. Will Charlie do it? My only criticism is that the film seems too short. It needed more time for details and character development. As it is, we sort of have to guess the details, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. I just wish the film would have gone the route of "Apocalypse Now" and given us more definition and development. Another minor criticism is that I wished they picked someone other than Emily Watson to play Capt. Stanley's wife. Not that she does a bad job in the role; it's just a matter of taste.The runtime is 104 minutes.FINAL WORD: "The Proposition" is one of those films that gets better with repeat viewings, as long as you like the approach of films like "Apocalypse Now," albeit way shorter (too short). I would love to see a Director's Cut that adds about 20-45 minutes.GRADE: B+