As Jack and his semi-disabled best friend Cricket (Dane DeHaan) try to finagle their way into the moonshining major leagues, Jack falls for Bertha (Mia Wasikowska), the sheltered daughter of a local preacher. Mumbling, inarticulate Forrest, meanwhile, fights his feelings for Maggie (Jessica Chastain), a woman with a past who has found shelter with the brothers.
As scripted by Nick Cave, “Lawless” tends to glamorize the mayhem the brothers wreak in their contest with Rakes; it does the same for a premarital bedroom encounter.
Granted that, left to their own devices, the Bondurants are fundamentally peace-loving and domestically inclined, and allowing for the vileness of the enemy they’re fighting, moviegoers will still need prudence to guide them through the ethical thickets. They’ll also need sufficient fortitude to resist giving way to the visceral reaction the proceedings seem calculated to elicit.
That’s assuming, of course, that the elements listed below have not put them off in the first place.
The film contains strong, often gory violence, including torture, mutilation and beatings; semi-graphic premarital sexual activity; upper female nudity; numerous uses of profanity; many rough and crude terms; and some crass language. The Catholic News Service classification is L – limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R – restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.
Mulderig is on the staff of Catholic News Service.