Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri – 2017
This review might make it sound like I didn’t like the movie, but nothing could be further from the truth. It was a highly enjoyable and exciting movie to watch. It had an awesome cast who created great characters, each of whom turned in flawless performances. It was an engaging story that drew me in and easily kept my attention. It was memorable and thought-provoking. But at the same time, there were a few glaring flaws that stuck in my craw as completely unrealistic, so much so that it seemed absurdly ridiculous.
Winning the Best Actress Oscar for her performance, Frances McDormand played Mildred Hayes, a mother whose daughter has been horribly raped and killed. After a thorough investigation, the police are unable to find the killer. In an effort to raise awareness that the police don’t seem to be doing their jobs, Mildred rents three billboards displaying, “RAPED WHILE DYING”, “AND STILL NO ARRESTS?”, and “HOW COME, CHIEF WILLOUGHBY?” On the surface, it sounds like a lawful, and possibly even clever way to raise awareness of a tragic situation, a way for a grieving mother to express her anger at a justice system that has failed her expectations, and maybe even a challenge to the authorities to get off their butts and do their jobs. The film portrays Mildred as a tough champion of justice who refuses to accept that the police have done everything they can.
The Officer in question, Chief Willoughby, is expertly played by Woody Harrelson. He was my favorite character in the whole movie. He was smart and compassionate. But he was also dying of cancer. While his professional integrity is the target of Mildred’s billboards, he sympathizes with her, and even secretly applauds her efforts by helping to pay the fees to keep the signs up. I particularly loved the scene in which he is interrogating Mildred. The two are verbally sparring when he unexpectedly coughs up blood all over her face. The two of them immediately shift their emotional energies, he to fear and apology, and she to motherly sympathy and concern. McDormand and Harrelson were really great in that moment.
The billboards, of course, are controversial, and the Police Department is offended. The most vocal of this opposition is Officer Dixon, played by Sam Rockwell. He is a racist alcoholic, and a complete moron. Unfortunately, his character arch was flawed. But this was a problem with the script, not with the way Rockwell played the part. In fact, he received a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his performance.
The challenge that started with Mildred and the billboards, was one that escalated into a dangerous war. When Willoughby commits suicide, everyone thinks it is over the billboards, when in fact, it was his cancer that was his reason. Dixon retaliates to his chief’s death by severely beating Red Welby, the owner of the company that owned the billboards, played by Caleb Landry, and throwing him out a second story window, for which he is fired from his job. Mildred refuses to take the signs down. The billboards are set on fire. Then Mildred throws Molotov cocktails at the police station, not knowing that Dixon is inside. He had been there reading a letter left to him by Chief Willoughby, telling him to let go of hate, and embrace love. With the building on fire, Dixon escapes, but suffers severe burns. Peter Dinklage plays Mildred’s friend who provides her with an alibi for starting the fire.
Dixon has a change of heart, becoming a good person. He puts himself in danger when he thinks he may have found the man who murdered Mildred’s daughter. Here is my second biggest beef with the film. In the end, Dixon is treated as a sympathetic character. But when the man, played by Brendan Sexton III, is proved innocent of that crime, Mildred and Dixon believe he is still guilty of other murders. They team up and go on a trip to kill him as a form of vigilante justice, though it is left unclear whether either of them have the conviction to go through with it.
OK, just because someone has a change of heart, doesn’t mean he shouldn’t have to face the realistic consequences of his past actions. When he proudly threw Welby out a second story window, losing his job wasn’t enough. That is attempted murder. With multiple witnesses, one of whom is the new police chief, he should have been immediately jailed and prosecuted. End of story. But after he sees the light, he is portrayed as a hero for trying to catch the killer? Nope. Not buying it.
But I think my biggest problem with the plot is something that undermines the entire premise of the film. The billboards, while they may have been perfectly legal, were fundamentally inappropriate. I think Mildred put them up to appease her own anger because the police couldn’t find the killer. And it was all explained to my satisfaction in a scene in which Willoughby talks to Mildred about the unsolved investigation. I’m sorry, but I’m on the Chief’s side. Some crimes can’t be solved. Sometimes the police do everything possible, and it isn’t enough, and it isn’t the police’s fault. Mildred had no idea what had been done, or could have been done, and she had no right to blame the police in such a public way. But all that being said, I still really liked the movie, even though it may sound like I didn’t.