PREVIEW, Hostiles: Review will follow

In his contribution to Studies in Classic American Literature, 1922-23, the British novelist D. H. Lawrence David Herbert Richards Lawrence (11 September 1885 – 2 March 1930) offered a grim assessment of America and Americans: “All the other stuff, the love, the democracy, the floundering into lust, is a sort of by-play. The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted.” Lawrence's observations of the ...The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic and a killer. It has never yet melted.” This D.H. quote is the first title (quote) in the film.

Set in 1892, the cowboy-Red Indian battles-butcheries story, Hostiles was released in two phases overseas, in September and December. It is releasing in India tomorrow. Two shows have been held for select audiences, but reviews are embargoed till the release. The film is produced by Waypoint Entertainment, Le Grisbi Productions and Bloom Media and distributed by    Entertainment Studios Motion Pictures.

A reversal of two digits brings 1982 to 1982, when writer Donald Stewart’s work Missing inspired director Constantin ‘Costa’ Gavras to make the eponymous movie Missing, about a journalist who had disappeared during a coup by Chilean dictator Augustus Pinochet. It starred Jack Lemmon in a very serious role and won and Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for Stewart and Costa-Gavras. Stewart went on to co-write three more films in the 80s and 90s: The Hunt for Red October, Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger (1994), the Jack Ryan trilogy. He died in 1999.The film Hostiles, released is based on a manuscript written by Donald Stewart in the 1980s/90s, and adapted by director and co-writer Scott Cooper.                          

Former combatants must band together to make a perilous trip from New Mexico to Montana in Director Scott Cooper’s new western adventure, Hostiles. Set in 1892, Cooper’s film tells the story of a U.S. Cavalry officer (Christian Bale) who reluctantly agrees to escort a dying Cheyenne war chief (Wes Studi) and his family on a harrowing journey from an isolated outpost in New Mexico through dangerous Comanche territory back to their tribal lands in Montana.

Author Stewart's was infatuated with cars, and motor racing. Missing could thus be read as much for its military-technical accuracy as its liberal intentions, the first line of the screenplay being. Savour these lines from the screenplay of Missing: "A weapons carrier straddles the centre line of a road", "Armoured vehicles rumble by” “A matte-black Huey gunship crackles overhead,” and “an army jeep moves slowly across the empty square."

Born in Detroit, in 1930, Stewart began as a journalist reporting for The Detroit Times, and then while still in his twenties, founded and co-published the car magazine, Competition Press that evolved into the current Autoweek fortnightly. In 1960, he moved to New York and became a becoming and creative executive for a number of famed agencies, such as J. Walter Thompson, Young & Rubicam and BBD & O. Then, in 1975, already in his mid- forties, Stewart moved to Hollywood to try his luck at screen-writing. His first produced script was Jackson County Jail, a 1976 Roger Corman road movie. It got strong critical notices and became a commercial success. The film gave Tommy Lee Jones his first feature lead.

Stewart had created a very successful first script, both critically and financially, but it was still a long way from Missing's screenplay, which is school-text book material.

Based on the book by Thomas Hauser, the final draft screenplay was completed on 5 February 1981, by Constantin Costa- Gavras, Stewart and John Nichols. In addition to Hostiles, Cooper’s credits include the feature films Black Mass, Out of the Furnace and Crazy Heart.

Donald Stewart’s Oscar acceptance speech for Missing: https://youtu.be/phMIJ96Ja10

Trailer of Hostiles: https://youtu.be/1M5cj4UmscE