Killers of the Flower Moon

Like The Irishman, Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon is around three-and-a-half hours long, but the running time doesn’t feel excessive, thanks to Scorsese’s direction and Robbie Robertson’s score. The film tells the true story of the murders of Osage Native Americans in the 1920s, killings committed by white settlers who married into Osage families to inherit the profits from oil wells in Osage County.

Robert De Niro’s character, King Hale, is a corrupt patriarch in the same vein as John Huston’s Noah Cross in Chinatown, though De Niro’s performance is more subtle than Huston’s. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Hale’s nephew, Ernest Burkhart—who loves his wife, but loves money even more—with an almost permanent frown. Relative newcomer Lily Gladstone is outstanding as Ernest’s stoic wife, Mollie.

Killers of the Flower Moon opened in cinemas yesterday, and will be available on Apple TV in the near future. One of Scorsese’s best films of the last two decades, it’s an epic late-career masterpiece from the world’s greatest living director (who makes a few cameo appearances, in front of the camera and in voiceover). The film’s Osage-language title is 𐓀𐒻͘𐓂͘𐓄𐒰 𐒹𐒿𐒰𐓆𐒼𐒰 𐓓𐒻͘𐒼𐒰 𐓊'𐒷𐓍𐒷.