Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
5 stars
Director: Martin McDonagh
Stars: Frances McDormand, Woody Harrelson, Sam Rockwell
Duration: 115 mins
Class: 15
KRS Releasing Ltd

Seven months have passed since her daughter was raped and murdered by the side of the road, so Mildred Hayes (Frances McDormand), angered and frustrated by the police’s lack of action, hires the titular three billboards to send a powerful message to police chief William Willoughby (Woody Harrelson). But, her actions only serve to provoke the ire of unhinged Officer Dixon (Sam Rockwell).

Mildred’s inspiration comes to her as she drives down a deserted stretch of highway where the billboards – empty, rusty, dilapidated – speak to her, almost begging to be used for some noble purpose.

The moment Mildred hires the billboards – much to the astonishment of Red (Caleb Landry Jones) who runs the office under whose responsibility they fall (and who soon finds himself at the wrong end of Officer Dixon’s wrath) – is the moment war is declared.

And yet, this is not a battle between good and evil epitomised by a righteous woman and an evil man.

Writer/director Martin McDonagh’s story presents a scenario where the warring protagonists are both flawed and are both in the right. Mildred’s grief and rage are justified and, yet, the film does not paint Willoughby as the villain.

Quite the opposite in fact and, in one of Harrelson’s more sympathetic performances, Willoughby is a loving family man and a revered and competent police chief. He is greatly aggrieved by Mildred’s pain but he is in reality powerless to do more than what he has already done and he has to contend with battles of his own. And, when he takes a decision that comes as a bit of a shock, his actions go a long way in attempting to resolve the issue.

It is Officer Dixon who is a bit of an unknown quantity. For all his blatantly racist and homophobic attitude, ultra-violent tendencies and complete lack of sympathy for Mildred’s plight, Dixon is damaged goods and Rockwell injects a healthy dose of tender humanity in the character, making it difficult for us to dismiss him as a mere psychopath.

A seamless amalgam of drama and black comedy

It is, however, McDormand’s film through and through, and she deservedly walked off with the best actress award at the Golden Globes while sweeping accolades left, right and centre. Her boiler suit-clad Mildred is a maelstrom of emotions – anger, grief, loss, guilt and in there somewhere is a smidgen of hope. Her actions have isolated her from the police, the community, her local church and even her own family, yet she shakes off every rebuke and censure with fire in her belly and admirable grit.

McDormand suffuses her performance with countless moments of raw beauty. Her recollection of the last conversation she had with her daughter -  a heated argument that has left her riddled with remorse – is pitifully heart-breaking.  Her put-down of the hapless Fr Montgomery (Nick Searcy) when he comes a-calling to advise her against her actions is acerbically hilarious.

No one is spared, everybody at some point is pierced by her sharp tongue… from some onlooking high school students to her obnoxious ex-husband (John Hawkes) to an acquaintance, James (the ever-reliable Peter Dinklage), who finagles a date out of her – while her internal fire is given a cathartic outlet as she ratchets things up a notch or two; nothing getting in the way of her mission to keep the memory of her daughter alive and bring the perpetrators to justice.

That the protagonists are ordinary people we can fully empathise with is the cause of much of the tension and drama, as both sides seek resolution. McDonagh’s script is a seamless amalgam of drama and black comedy, peppered with genuine moments of poignancy and some unfettered violence as Mildred fights to the end.

To his credit, the director eschews a neat and tidy finale, offering an ending that does not answer all the questions, yet, depending on what the viewer takes from the movie, leaves the protagonists with the promise of some measure of peace in the middle of the uncertainty.

A horrific crime; lack of action by the authorities concerned; a woman takes matters into her own hands until she is heard and justice is served even though she is seen as nothing but a nuisance. Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri couldn’t be more topical. And Mildred Hayes, a working-class heroine who channels her anger and frustrations into civic action, is an inspiration to all those women fighting for justice in these troubled times.