Checked out the new Netflix original – and Coen Brothers film – The Ballad of Buster Scruggs. This is a movie that probably could have never been funded for theatrical release – it’s a 2hr 20min western anthology film… a combination that would probably flop…. but fits well on Netflix’s whatever goes strategy.

This movie consists of six short films all set in some version of the Old West. Some films are comedies, some tragedies, and one is kind of an off-beat horror/suspense film. Not all are hits but all are interesting. They will also make you go, “what’s going on here?” and “what was THAT all about”… but when you think back on all the stories, you start to see connections. Sure, some of those connections are about the circular fallibility of humanity, misanthropy, ugliness, and the comic joke that is the myth of the cowboy… but at least they are about SOMETHING.

I was never bored by any of these short films though sometimes I was genuinely wondering why some of them were so aimless. That’s one big reason it works better on Netflix than it would sitting through the whole thing at the theater. I recommend this film though with a recommendation to take a break between the shorts if you start feeling antsy or gloomy.

Score: 84