TL;DR – A fascinating exploration of how easy it is to twist and abuse power when no one is willing to stand up to it.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid for the Netflix service that viewed this film.

Rebel Ridge Review –

My professional background is in International Relations, and at the core of much of that is the idea of power. How do you keep power? How do you use power? How can you counter those with power? This can often be found in the exploration of the Melian Dialogue, where “the strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must”. A touchstone for our setting today. However, what happens if someone comes in to mess with that power?    

So, to set the scene, Terry Richmond (Aaron Pierre) was riding his bike one day with his music blaring when, unbeknownst to him, the police were tailing him. One sideswipe later, and being pushed to the ground while injured, Terry is arrested, and the money he was bringing to bail out his cousin was ‘confiscated’ by the police. Civil forfeiture: All the police need to do is have a suspicion that the money is an illegal gain, and they can take it, and the Shelby Springs Police Department did just that. Now Terry is on a ticking clock because if his cousin gets sent to state prison, he will be killed.    

What we get with Reble Ridge is a film with two sides that get meshed together. On the one hand, there is the exploration of the use of and corruption of power. But then, this is also an action film, and an action film has to action. Quite often, when you get a movie with two halves, it creates a disconnect that holds it back. This week, we get an excellent example of when both sides can be used to complement each other. I was often reminded of the Reacher series while watching this because of the thematic similarities, but it is also an excellent example of meshing those two halves together. It also helps that we get a lot of character actors absolutely nailing their parts.   

At the heart of our movie today is the concept of Civil Forfeiture, an ethically dubious legal practice in America that can be the focus of corruption. It does make the perfect legal entry point for this film because it so quickly becomes the heart of the coming conflict. Corrupt cops take money and lock up innocent people but then funnel that money back into the community so everyone has an incentive to look away. There is often a phrase bandied about “only a couple of rotten apples”, but people forget the rest of that saying, “spoil the rest of the bunch”. We see that play out here when the police pick the wrong person to steal money from.

There is a good sense of the escalation towards violence here, as you do feel that it is the final resort. We get a feeling of how the rest of the action is going to go from the first confrontation, where we see Terry take down and embarrass Chief Sandy Burnne (Don Johnson) and Officer Evan Marston (David Denman). Constantly unbalancing one to give him time to take out the other. Terry uses less-than-lethal force, which makes an excellent counterbalance to everyone else shooting their guns. They space the action scenes out and vary their set-up to make sure it never starts feeling samey. Also, the stunt team did an excellent job bringing it to life.

While I did generally enjoy this film, it did start to feel like it ran a bit long, and we could have gotten a tight 90-minute movie here. While Summer McBride (AnnaSophia Robb) starts off as an interesting character, the narrative does not do her justice as it goes on. Also, the film kept hinting that there was more thematic substance under the hood, but it never wanted to explore it. For example, the film wants to hint at a whole bunch of racial and class issues. But it does not have the conviction to follow through on them.

In the end, do we recommend Rebel Ridge? While it never got to the depth that it could have, it was still a strong basis for a story. Also, the action is well worth the watch. If you liked Rebel Ridge, we would recommend to you Kill.

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

Have you watched Rebel Ridge?, let us know what you thought in the comments below, feel free to share this review on any of the social medias and you can follow us Here. Check out all our past reviews and articles Here, and have a happy day. 

Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Rebel Ridge
Directed by – Jeremy Saulnier
Written by – Jeremy Saulnier
Music by – Brooke Blair & Will Blair
Cinematography by – David Gallego
Edited by – Jeremy Saulnier
Production/Distribution Companies – Filmscience, Bonneville Pictures & Netflix
Starring – Aaron Pierre, Don Johnson, AnnaSophia Robb, David Denman, Emory Cohen, Steve Zissis, Zsané Jhé, Dana Lee & James Cromwell with Daniel Chung, Dana Lee, CJ LeBlanc, Leslie Nipkow, Clayton Cooper, Caleb Thaggard & Jordan Thoma
Rating – Australia: MA15+;