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'''''Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri''''' is a 2017 [[black comedy]] [[crime film]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://theintercept.com/2017/11/26/three-billboards-outside-ebbing-missouri/|title="Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" Is the Dark Comedy for the Age of Criminal Justice Reform|work=[[The Intercept]]|first=Zaid |last=Jilani|date=November 26, 2017|accessdate=December 5, 2017}}</ref> written, produced, and directed by [[Martin McDonagh]]. It stars [[Frances McDormand]], [[Woody Harrelson]], [[Sam Rockwell]], [[John Hawkes (actor)|John Hawkes]], and [[Peter Dinklage]]. The film follows a mother who, when the police in her town fail to find a suspect in her daughter's murder, rents three billboards to call public attention to the unsolved crime, polarizing the community. The local police force falls into disarray with the suicide of their sheriff, leading to a fired police officer attempting unsuccessfully to solve the case himself.
'''''Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri''''' is a 2017 [[black comedy]] [[crime film]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://theintercept.com/2017/11/26/three-billboards-outside-ebbing-missouri/|title="Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" Is the Dark Comedy for the Age of Criminal Justice Reform|work=[[The Intercept]]|first=Zaid |last=Jilani|date=November 26, 2017|accessdate=December 5, 2017}}</ref> written, produced, and directed by [[Martin McDonagh]]. It stars [[Frances McDormand]], [[Woody Harrelson]], [[Sam Rockwell]], [[John Hawkes (actor)|John Hawkes]], and [[Peter Dinklage]]. The film follows a mother who, when the police in her town fail to find a suspect in her daughter's murder, rents three billboards to call public attention to the unsolved crime, polarizing the community.


The film was screened in the main competition of the [[74th Venice International Film Festival]], where it premiered on September 4, 2017.<ref name="InComp">{{cite web|url=http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/venice-film-festival-unveils-lineup-74th-edition-1024415|title=Venice Competition Includes Films From George Clooney, Guillermo del Toro, Darren Aronofsky|work=[[The Hollywood Reporter]]|publisher=[[Prometheus Global Media|Prometheus Global Media, LLC]]|accessdate=27 July 2017}}</ref> It also played at the [[2017 Toronto International Film Festival]],<ref name="TIFF">{{cite web|url=http://deadline.com/2017/07/toronto-film-festival-2017-margot-robbie-gary-oldman-jake-gyllenhaal-emma-stone-christian-bale-1202135285/|title=Toronto Film Festival 2017 Unveils Strong Slate|work=[[Deadline.com]]|accessdate=25 July 2017}}</ref> where it won its top prize, the [[Toronto International Film Festival People's Choice Award|People's Choice Award]].<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Lotito |first1=Thomas |title='Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri' Wins Top Prize at Toronto |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=2017-09-17 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/17/arts/three-billboards-outside-ebbing-missouri-wins-top-prize-at-toronto.html |issn=0362-4331 |df=mdy-all }}</ref> It was also screened at the [[Mar del Plata International Film Festival]].<ref>{{Citation|title=Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017)|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5027774/releaseinfo|accessdate=2017-11-21}}</ref>
The film was screened in the main competition of the [[74th Venice International Film Festival]], where it premiered on September 4, 2017.<ref name="InComp">{{cite web|url=http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/venice-film-festival-unveils-lineup-74th-edition-1024415|title=Venice Competition Includes Films From George Clooney, Guillermo del Toro, Darren Aronofsky|work=[[The Hollywood Reporter]]|publisher=[[Prometheus Global Media|Prometheus Global Media, LLC]]|accessdate=27 July 2017}}</ref> It also played at the [[2017 Toronto International Film Festival]],<ref name="TIFF">{{cite web|url=http://deadline.com/2017/07/toronto-film-festival-2017-margot-robbie-gary-oldman-jake-gyllenhaal-emma-stone-christian-bale-1202135285/|title=Toronto Film Festival 2017 Unveils Strong Slate|work=[[Deadline.com]]|accessdate=25 July 2017}}</ref> where it won its top prize, the [[Toronto International Film Festival People's Choice Award|People's Choice Award]].<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Lotito |first1=Thomas |title='Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri' Wins Top Prize at Toronto |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=2017-09-17 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/17/arts/three-billboards-outside-ebbing-missouri-wins-top-prize-at-toronto.html |issn=0362-4331 |df=mdy-all }}</ref> It was also screened at the [[Mar del Plata International Film Festival]].<ref>{{Citation|title=Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017)|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5027774/releaseinfo|accessdate=2017-11-21}}</ref>

Revision as of 15:50, 12 January 2018

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Theatrical release poster
Directed byMartin McDonagh
Written byMartin McDonagh
Produced by
Starring
CinematographyBen Davis
Edited byJon Gregory
Music byCarter Burwell
Production
companies
Distributed byFox Searchlight Pictures
Release dates
  • September 4, 2017 (2017-09-04) (Venice)
  • November 10, 2017 (2017-11-10) (United States)
  • January 12, 2018 (2018-01-12) (United Kingdom)
Running time
115 minutes[2]
Countries
  • United Kingdom
  • United States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$12 million[3]
Box office$26 million[4]

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri is a 2017 black comedy crime film[5] written, produced, and directed by Martin McDonagh. It stars Frances McDormand, Woody Harrelson, Sam Rockwell, John Hawkes, and Peter Dinklage. The film follows a mother who, when the police in her town fail to find a suspect in her daughter's murder, rents three billboards to call public attention to the unsolved crime, polarizing the community.

The film was screened in the main competition of the 74th Venice International Film Festival, where it premiered on September 4, 2017.[6] It also played at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival,[7] where it won its top prize, the People's Choice Award.[8] It was also screened at the Mar del Plata International Film Festival.[9]

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri was theatrically released in the United States on November 10, 2017, and is scheduled to be released in the United Kingdom by Fox Searchlight Pictures on January 12, 2018.[10] It received acclaim from critics, who praised its screenplay, direction, and performances, particularly those of McDormand, Harrelson, and Rockwell, and was named as one of the top 10 films of the year by the American Film Institute.[11]

At the 75th Golden Globe Awards, the film won the awards for Best Motion Picture – Drama, Best Actress – Drama (McDormand), Best Supporting Actor (Rockwell), and Best Screenplay, while also receiving nominations for Best Director and Best Original Score.[12] At the 71st British Academy Film Awards, the film received nine nominations, including Best Film, Best Director, and Best Actress in a Leading Role (McDormand), as well as Best Actor in a Supporting Role nods for both Rockwell and Harrelson.[13]

Plot

Mildred Hayes is a divorced mother, grieving the rape and murder of her teenage daughter Angela, seven months prior. Angry over the lack of progress in the investigation, she rents three abandoned billboards near her home, which in sequence read "RAPED WHILE DYING", "AND STILL NO ARRESTS?", and "HOW COME, CHIEF WILLOUGHBY?"

The townspeople are upset over the billboards, including Sheriff Bill Willoughby and officer Jason Dixon. The open secret that Willoughby suffers from terminal pancreatic cancer adds to their disapproval. Mildred and her depressed son Robbie are harassed and threatened, but she stays firm, to Robbie's chagrin.

While Willoughby is sympathetic to Mildred's frustration, he finds the billboards an unfair attack on his character. Dixon is vexed by Mildred's lack of respect for his authority, and counters by threatening Red, who rented the billboards to her, and arresting her friend and co-worker Denise on trivial marijuana-possession charges. Mildred is also visited by her abusive ex-husband Charlie, who hurtfully blames her for their daughter's death.

Willoughby brings Mildred in for questioning after she injures her dentist in an altercation in his clinic. During the interview, Willoughby begins coughing up blood, a sign that his illness is becoming severe. He leaves the hospital against medical advice, and spends an idyllic day with his wife Anne and two daughters before committing suicide. He leaves suicide notes for several people in Ebbing, including one to Mildred in which he explains that she wasn't a factor in his suicide, and that he secretly paid to keep the billboards up for another month, amusing himself with the antagonism they would continue to draw to her after his passing. His prediction proves correct, and Mildred receives a violent threat from a stranger who enters her store. Dixon reacts to the news of Willoughby's death by assaulting Red and his assistant. This is witnessed by Willoughby's replacement, Abercrombie, who fires him.

The billboards are destroyed by arson. Mildred retaliates by tossing Molotov cocktails at the police station, which she believes is unoccupied for the night. However, Dixon is there to read a letter left for him by Willoughby, in which the sheriff advises him to let go of hate and learn to love, as the only way to realize his wish to become a detective. Dixon escapes the blaze with Angela's case files, suffering severe burns. Sympathetic acquaintance James witnesses the incident and provides Mildred with an alibi, claiming they were together on a date.

Discharged from the hospital, Dixon overhears the man who earlier threatened Mildred, bragging in a bar of an incident similar to Angela's murder. He notes the Idaho license plate number of the man's vehicle, then provokes a fight in which he scratches a DNA sample from his face for forensic comparison to samples from Angela's murder. Meanwhile, Mildred is on a faux date to thank James for the alibi, when Charlie enters with his 19-year old girlfriend Penelope, and admits to drunkenly setting the billboard fires. Though enraged, Mildred simply instructs Charlie to treat Penelope well, before leaving.

Dixon contacts Mildred about his hopeful discovery of Angela's killer. However, it turns out the man's DNA doesn't match, and he was on overseas military duty at the time of the murder. Although both are disappointed, they conclude that the man must be guilty of some other rape, and set out for Idaho to kill him anyway. On the way, Mildred confesses to the police station fire. "Well, who else would've done it?" he replies. Both express reservations about their mission, but agree to decide on the way.

Cast

Production

McDonagh was inspired to write the movie after seeing billboards about an unsolved crime while traveling "somewhere down in the Georgia, Florida, Alabama corner".[14] Of the event that inspired the film, McDonagh stated "the rage that put a bunch of billboards like that up was palpable and stayed with me".[15] Eventually he was inspired to create a fictional scenario around such a situation, noting, "Once I decided, in my head, that it was a mother, everything fell into place."[15]

The character of Mildred was written with Frances McDormand in mind.[16] McDormand initially wanted the character to be a grandmother which McDonagh disagreed with, feeling that it would change the story too much.[16][17] Eventually McDormand's husband Joel Coen convinced her to take the part regardless.[16] McDormand took inspiration for her character from John Wayne. This eventually inspired Sam Rockwell to take inspiration for his character in part from Wayne's co-star in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Lee Marvin, noting that he wanted to make his character "the exact opposite" of Mildred.[16] As with Mildred being written for McDormand, the character of Dixon was specifically written for Rockwell.[16]

Principal photography began on May 2, 2016, in Sylva, North Carolina.[18] Filming lasted 33 days.[19]

Soundtrack

Track Listing[20]

No.TitleLength
1."Mildred Goes to War"1:22
2."The Deer"2:06
3."Buckskin Stallion Blues"2:59
4."A Cough of Blood, A Dark Drive"2:37
5."I’ve Been Arrested"0:38
6."Fruit Loops"1:29
7."His Master’s Voice"4:49
8."Billboards On Fire"2:24
9."Slippers"1:19
10."The Last Rose of Summer"4:51
11."My Dear Anne"2:35
12."Walk Away Renée"2:44
13."Billboards Are Back"1:24
14."Collecting Samples"1:15
15."Sorry Welby"1:43
16."The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down"3:23
17."Countermove"1:56
18."Can’t Give Up Hope"0:30
19."Buckskin Stallion Blues"3:21

Release

Fox Searchlight Pictures released Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri on November 10, 2017. The film had screenings at the 74th Venice International Film Festival,[6] the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival,[7] the 2017 San Sebastián International Film Festival, where it won the Audience Award,[21] the BFI London Film Festival,[22] and the 2017 Zurich Film Festival.[23]

Box office

In its limited opening weekend, the film made $322,168 from four theaters for a per-theater average of $80,542, the fourth best of 2017.[24] The film made $1.1 million from 53 theaters in its second weekend and $4.4 million from 614 in its third, finishing a respective 9th and 10th at the box office.[25]

Critical response

On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 93% based on 248 reviews and an average rating of 8.6/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri deftly balances black comedy against searing drama – and draws unforgettable performances from its veteran cast along the way."[26] On Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating to reviews, the film has a weighted average score of 88 out of 100, based on 50 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[27] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A–" on an A+ to F scale.[28]

Accolades

Main article: List of accolades received by Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

References

  1. ^ a b c d "Film releases". Variety Insight. Retrieved July 3, 2017.
  2. ^ "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri". tiff. Retrieved September 12, 2017.
  3. ^ D'Alessandro, Anthony (December 1, 2017). "Exhibition Rings Up Fox Searchlight To Expand 'Three Billboards' Coast To Coast – Box Office". Deadline.com. Retrieved December 1, 2017.
  4. ^ "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved January 11, 2018.
  5. ^ Jilani, Zaid (November 26, 2017). ""Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" Is the Dark Comedy for the Age of Criminal Justice Reform". The Intercept. Retrieved December 5, 2017.
  6. ^ a b "Venice Competition Includes Films From George Clooney, Guillermo del Toro, Darren Aronofsky". The Hollywood Reporter. Prometheus Global Media, LLC. Retrieved July 27, 2017.
  7. ^ a b "Toronto Film Festival 2017 Unveils Strong Slate". Deadline.com. Retrieved July 25, 2017.
  8. ^ Lotito, Thomas (September 17, 2017). "'Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri' Wins Top Prize at Toronto". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331.
  9. ^ Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017), retrieved November 21, 2017
  10. ^ "Death Wish, The Mountain Between Us and More Get Release Changes, Dates". ComingSoon.net. June 8, 2017. Retrieved June 9, 2017.
  11. ^ "AFI Awards 2017". AFI. Retrieved December 8, 2017.
  12. ^ Rubin, Rebecca (December 11, 2017). "Golden Globe Nominations: Complete List". Variety. Retrieved December 11, 2017.
  13. ^ "The Shape of Water leads Bafta nominations". BBC News. January 9, 2018. Retrieved January 9, 2018.
  14. ^ Pruner, Aaron. "'Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri' Director Martin McDonagh on the Story That Inspired His Film [Interview]". Slashfilm. Retrieved December 13, 2017.
  15. ^ a b Radish, Christina. "Martin McDonagh on Directing 'Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri' and Writing for Frances McDormand". Collider. Retrieved December 13, 2017.
  16. ^ a b c d e Fear, David. "Signs of the Times: Inside 'Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri'". Rolling Stone. Retrieved December 14, 2017.
  17. ^ MCGOVERN, JOE. "Frances McDormand talks her love for 'rhythmic profanity' — and reveals her favorite curse word". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved December 14, 2017.
  18. ^ Saylor, Jennifer (May 3, 2016). "Big movie comes to Sylva: shooting dates for 'Three Billboards'". WLOS News 13. Retrieved May 6, 2016.
  19. ^ Brooks, Brian (November 9, 2017). "Searchlight Posts 'Three Billboards'; The Orchard Has Norway's 'Thelma' – Specialty B.O. Preview". Deadline.com. Retrieved November 28, 2017.
  20. ^ Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri’ Soundtrack Announced
  21. ^ "City of Donostia / San Sebastian Audience Award". San Sebastián International Film Festival. Retrieved September 30, 2017.
  22. ^ "Martin McDonagh's Three Billboards to Close London Film Festival 2017". What's Worth Seeing. Retrieved August 22, 2017.
  23. ^ "'Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri' 'Custody,' 'Under the Tree' to Compete in Zurich". Variety. Retrieved October 3, 2017.
  24. ^ Brooks, Brian (November 12, 2017). "Searchlight's 'Three Billboards' Signals Robust Bow; 'Lady Bird' Soars – Specialty B.O." Retrieved November 14, 2017.
  25. ^ D'Alessandro, Anthony (November 26, 2017). "Thanksgiving B.O. At $268M, +3% Over 2016 Spurred By 'Coco' & Holdovers". Deadline.com. Retrieved November 26, 2017.
  26. ^ "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017)". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango. Retrieved December 5, 2017.
  27. ^ "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved November 15, 2017.
  28. ^ D'Alessandro, Anthony (December 1, 2017). "Coco' Looking At Sweet $27M+ Second Weekend As Majors Take A Holiday From Any New Wide Releases – Late Night Update". Deadline.com. Retrieved December 2, 2017.
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