'Rebel Ridge' Review

Jeremy Saulnier’s long-delayed action flick is a masterclass in economic filmmaking.

If you asked me who the greatest action director was of all time, I’d have to definitely shout out both John McTiernan (Predator, Die Hard) and Tony Scott (Crimson Tide, Unstoppable): both elevated typical genre fare into memorable classics that usually centered around a single protagonist facing almost impossible odds. In his first film in years (interrupted by COVID, a lead actor walking out, and multiple strikes), Jeremy Saulnier has finally got to make the movie he started way back in 2019, and although it unfortunately was made to stream only on Netflix, it still managed to deliver some great small-screen action in the vein of the aforementioned great directors.

The premise is similar to the samurai films of Akira Kurosawa like Yojimbo and Sanjuro, where a lone warrior comes into a town and finds himself confronted by its corrupt leaders. The warrior in this case is Terry Richmond (Aaron Pierre), a former Marine who has come to the small town of Shelby Springs, Alabama to post bail for his cousin and help him start a new life. As soon as he arrives, he has a run-in with the corrupt police force that runs the town, led by Don Johnson’s crooked Chief Sandy Burnne. Richmond is reluctant to get involved in the shady dealings of the town and is hesitant to stir up trouble, but when circumstances- and duty- calls for it, he takes action and proves to be more of a problem for the Chief than he was expecting.

I went into this unsure if this was going to just be some political commentary on the police in the U.S., but was pleasantly surprised to find the script to be more nuanced than that: there are good cops and bad ones, and the screenplay sidesteps any sort of racial politics that one would expect in a film like this in favor of a tight, laser-focused story where every scene and line of dialogue serves to either move the plot forward or give us a glimpse into the lives of the characters. Saulnier got his start with a little film called Blue Ruin back in 2013 on a (relatively) meager budget of $420,000, so its no surprise that this film uses every shot and scene to its utmost advantage (unfortunately the budget for this film has not been posted yet but I would definitely guess it is under $50,000,000).

The characters- both good and bad- are competent and make smart decisions throughout the course of the film: plot developments follow logically from one another in a satisfying way and lead to payoffs down the line. I don’t want to give too much away, but even when Pierre’s Terry Richmond is fighting, he maintains great moral character in his actions in a way I found refreshing and different from the typical John Wick style of shoot-em-ups that fall into the same genre.

Overall, Rebel Ridge is a solid action thriller that should’ve been screened in theaters everywhere, but if you have Netflix and are a fan of action movies, I would definitely recommend checking it out.