A History of Violence – Review

Two criminals, Leland (McHattie) and Billy (Bryk) exit their hotel room, with a plan to continue heading east and sticking to small towns instead of big cities. They are clearly tired of their road trip as they toss their bags into a blue convertible Chevy Cavalier with a douchey spoiler.

As Leland checks out from the office, it is clear that these extremely dangerous and unflinching men leave all places worse off than when they arrived. Honestly, it’s hard to imagine worse people.

In tiny town Millbrook, Indiana, a young child Sarah wakes up from a nightmare and her father Tom Stall (Mortensen) comforts her while her brother Jack (Holmes) checks in to make sure there are no monsters in her room. As Edie (Bello) joins her kids and husband, the family bonds.

The morning light brings breakfast and a ride to work for Tom since his truck isn’t starting again. Edie drops him at the post office and Tom walks up the street to Stall’s Diner to open for business. Everything is normal for this small-town family.

As class fuckhead Bobby bullies Jack for making a catch in baseball during gym, we learn that this town is full of dipshit asshole kids, just like any other. Still, this problem is about to be small potatoes, as a couple of travelers stop into Tom’s diner before it closes for the night.

Scumbuckets Leland and Bobby are looking for coffee and pie, despite the disclaimer that the eatery is shutting down for the night. This event leads to some surprising outcomes, and kicks off a chain of crazy chaos, and a few surprises.

A History of Violence is very well shot and whips by in its short runtime. While some of the story beats have definitely been done before, the script gives us a credible and sympathetic family, as well as horrific and deadly criminals. The story takes nice turns, especially for those with no idea what is coming.

Well shot, well written and well-acted with a strong cast, A History of Violence is worth your time, though it does bring some dark moments and some shocking events. It is an adaptation of a graphic novel, and the “international cut” of the film features minute differences of a tiny bit more violence.