Territory
Genre: Crime/Mystery
Director: S. Craig Zahler
Writers: Jimmy Ellis & Dwight Gallo
Cast: Vince Vaughn, Grace Dove, Elisabeth Shue, Graham Greene, Dwight Yoakam, Kelly Macdonald, Clayne Crawford, Martin Sensmeier, Rod Rondeaux, Gil Birmingham
Plot: Roland “Rollie” Graves (Vince Vaughn) is awoken by a phone call in the middle of the night. Still half-drunk from drinking earlier in the evening, Rollie answers the phone. On the line is his boss, Lone Spring Sheriff Willie Haas (Dwight Yoakam), telling him to get his ass down to the town’s border with the Green Rock Indian Reservation. Rollie asks what’s so important at this hour in the middle of no-man’s land, and Haas tells Rollie that his partner Jon has been found dead. Rollie stops off for coffee and a bear claw on his way down to the crime scene. Rollie blasts Bob Seger’s “Mainstreet“ on the drive while he processes what has happened.
At the small Green Rock Reservation police station, Detective Winona Whitedeer (Grace Dove) and Sheriff Swiftwater (Graham Greene) get into a squad car on their way to the crime scene. This is Winona’s first murder case and she nervously asks Swiftwater all kinds of questions. He tells her to save the questions for when they get to the scene. She asks where the body was found, and he tells her that’s where the case gets a little extra tricky: the body was apparently found directly on the border between the reservation and the jurisdiction of the Lone Spring police department. He adds that he has already talked with Sheriff Haas of Lone Spring and arranged for Winona to work with the best detective Haas has available as part of a special joint task force.
By the time Rollie arrives at the crime scene his drunkenness has turned into a hangover. He swallows a fist full of aspirin as he walks toward the scene. Haas gives Rollie his condolences and informs Rollie that he will be working the case as he’s the only available detective right now. Rollie takes a look at the body, immediately noticing several stab wounds but no blood on the ground. Rollie quickly deduces that Jon Uhls, his former partner, was killed elsewhere and dumped there. Rollie asks who found the body, but just as Haas is about to answer they are interrupted by the arrival of Winona and Swiftwater. Winona eagerly introduces herself to Rollie, who looks perplexed. Haas tells Rollie that since the body was found on the border, they’ll be working directly with the reservation’s police force on the case. Rollie is annoyed by the situation and suggests that they just hand over the case to the tribal police. Haas pulls Rollie aside and tells him that he wouldn’t want any other detective on the case to track down Jon’s killer, but that they have to work with the reservation on this one for political reasons. Rollie walks back over to Winona and Swiftwater. He tells them that he will agree to work on the case with them, but he wants to do things his way. They discuss the evidence at the scene, which isn’t much. Winona begins picking Rollie’s brain. The questions quickly get on Rollie’s hungover nerves and he snaps at her. She apologizes for annoying him, insisting she just wants to do her best to find the killer responsible. Rollie asks Winona if she knows who the deceased is. She confesses that she does not. Rollie goes on to explain that Jon was his partner and best friend for over a decade. She asks who Rollie thinks could have wanted Jon dead. Rollie chuckles at the question, joking that Jon butted heads with everyone so that there would be too many suspects to bring down to the station. Rollie asks Haas if Jon’s wife has been notified. Haas shakes his head, saying that he thought the news would come best from Rollie.
Rollie enters the Uhls residence without knocking as he has a key to the house. He walks straight to the fridge and cracks open a cold beer. Jon’s wife, Carmen (Elisabeth Shue), greets Rollie with a kiss - a romantic kiss. Rollie tells Carmen to sit down. Rollie quickly downs the beer before blurting out that Jon is dead. Carmen quickly tears up as Rollie holds her. They drop onto the couch and their embrace turns sexual as Carmen takes off her top. The two proceed to have sex on the couch. Afterward Rollie comments on how messed up it is that they did that right after the news he broke. Carmen remarks that it’s not like it was the first time they had sex together. Rollie concedes her point as he gets up and starts getting dressed again. Carmen asks him where he’s going. Rollie says that he’s off to find out who killed Jon.
Back at the Green Rock police station, Winona thanks Sheriff Swiftwater for pairing him with Rollie on the case. He warns her to be careful though as Rollie is known to be a bit of a loose cannon and he doesn’t want his niece to get caught up in some of the things he may do. Winona asks if Rollie is a good detective. Swiftwater says Rollie is probably the best detective in the region when he’s not drunk or pissed off about something. They are interrupted by the leader of the reservation, Chief Summerhill (Gil Birmingham). He asks Winona if she is excited to be working a high profile murder case. Before she can answer, Chief Summerhill tells Winona not to forget where she got her start as a police officer.
Rollie returns to his actual home where his wife Maggie (Kelly Macdonald) is smoking cigarettes and watching daytime talk shows. She gets up and hugs him, saying that Jon’s murder has been all over the news. Rollie grabs a beer and sits down in front of the television next to his wife and begins to zone out. Before long, there is a knock at the door. Maggie gets up to answer, finding her ne’er-do-well brother Mitch Mueller (Clayne Crawford) at the door. Maggie quietly tries to tell her brother that now is not a good time for him to show up. Having heard Mitch’s voice, Rollie is quickly on his feet and at the door. He yells at Mitch to get away from his house. Mitch insists that it’s Maggie’s house too and he’s her brother so he’s automatically welcome. Things quickly escalate into a physical altercation between Mitch and Rollie, one where Rollie is clearly physically superior. Sheriff Haas arrives and pulls Rollie off of Mitch. Rollie demands to know what Haas is doing there. Haas tells him that Winona is waiting for him at the station to work on the case and that he came to drive Rollie over, assuming that Rollie has already been drinking too much to legally drive himself. As Haas and Rollie drive away, Maggie tends to Mitch’s wounds in the front yard.
Rollie and Haas find Winona waiting at the station for them. Haas leaves Rollie with Winona to work the case, though he advises her that if they are going anywhere that Winona should do the driving. Winona starts talking about the various objects found in the general vicinity of Jon’s body. Rollie tells her that none of that is going to point them to the killer because garbage on the side of the road doesn’t kill, people kill, so they need to focus on finding a suspect. Winona asks how Jon treated the criminals he arrested. Rollie jokes that most probably followed the law after Jon treated them. She suggests that maybe the killer could have been someone Jon had recently arrested. They pull all the files of everyone that Jon arrested in the month prior to his death. They each find a name that catches their attention. Rollie discovers that Jon had arrested his brother-in-law Mitch just days before the murder on a drunk and disorderly charge, while Winona discovers that Billy Summerhill, the son of the chief of the Green Rock Tribe, was detained by Jon but it was over the reservation border so Jon was forced to begrudgingly release him.
Winona decides to take the information about Jon’s run-in with Billy back to her station on the reservation to consult with her uncle. Swiftwater shows Winona an entire folder filled with reports on crimes perpetrated by Billy, both on and off the reservation, that the tribal chief has swept under the rug. Winona tells her uncle that she has a hunch Billy could be a solid suspect in the murder of Jon Uhls. Swiftwater warns Winona that they’ll never get permission from the Chief to arrest or even question Billy on tribal lands, so her best hope would be that Billy slips up in Lone Spring and apprehend him for a crime there.
The next morning, Rollie and Winona discuss their suspects with each other. Rollie mentions Mitch as a possible suspect. Winona mentions that she doesn’t think Mitch matches the profile of a murderer and that Rollie’s personal hatred for the man could be clouding his judgement. Rollie admits that Jon had a history of run-ins with Native Americans over the years, including with Billy. Rollie confesses that he always did what he could to cover it up to preserve Jon’s career, but that Jon was getting angrier toward everyone and everything in the time leading up to his death. Winona tells Rollie about Swiftwater’s idea to keep an eye on Billy Summerhill until he slips up in Lone Spring. Rollie likes the idea, but asks how they’re supposed to know when Billy is in town. Winona calls Swiftwater and asks if he can keep an eye on Billy around the reservation and let them know if Billy heads toward town. Swiftwater promises to do what he can without the chief finding out.
Rollie goes home for a fresh change of clothes to find Mitch sitting on his couch, watching his TV and drinking his beer. Rollie snaps. He grabs the beer bottle and hits Mitch over the head with it. Maggie storms into the room and screams at Rollie to not hurt her brother. Rollie punches Mitch several times until Mitch is barely conscious. Maggie tells Rollie that he should just leave for good and go back to sleeping with his best friend’s wife, revealing that she knows about Rollie’s affair with Carmen. Rollie leaves the house without saying a word. As he gets in his car, he calls Winona. She is in her car tailing Billy Summerhill (Martin Sensmeier) around the reservation. Rollie calls her. He tells her not to worry about Mitch anymore as a possible suspect and asks where she is. She tells him that she is keeping an eye on Billy for the time being. Rollie tells her to be careful.
Rollie arrives at Carmen’s house and tells her that he has decided to leave Maggie and move in with her. Carmen sees right through him as she can tell Maggie just kicked him out. She accepts Rollie moving in anyway. He gives her a kiss.
Winona follows Billy down an alleyway, but loses him. She gets out of the car to search, but is attacked by Billy. He holds pins her against her car and is about to rape her when Sheriff Swiftwater arrives and shoots Billy in the leg. Billy yells that his dad will have Swiftwater fired. Swiftwater then knocks Billy out with a punch to the face. Swiftwater helps Winona up, asking if she is okay. She says she is fine. Swiftwater tells her that it looks like he just decided to retire.
Jack Warcloud (Rod Rondeaux) is caught breaking into a house to sleep and the police are called. He is arrested for trespassing. Once at the station, the arresting officers do a search and find the waller of Jon Uhls in Jack’s possession. Sheriff Haas immediately called Rollie down to the station, stating that they may have stumbled upon Jon’s killer. When Rollie arrives at the station, he finds Jack in an interrogation room. Jack proclaims that he has never killed anyone but refuses to tell the police how or where he came into possession of Jon’s waller. Rollie doesn’t think Warcloud is their man and tells Haas to call him if Warcloud actually has something interesting to say. Warcloud suddenly goes for a police officer’s gun. Rollie notices this and shoots Warcloud several times in the chest before he can use the stolen gun.
Sheriff Haas holds a press conference. He announces that his department believes that they caught the man responsible to Detective Jon Uhls’ murder on an unrelated charge, but that the man was killed in an exchange of gunfire with detectives. Haas commends both the detectives of his precinct and that of the Green Rock tribal police for bringing justice for the death of their fallen brother in blue.
Chief Summerhill offers Winona the job as the new sheriff of the Green Rock tribal police force, but warns her that she would be expected to toe the line better than her uncle did. Winona declines the offer. She chooses instead to stick up for her uncle and tell the chief what his son tried to do to her. She walks out of the heeting, head held high.
Weeks pass and the Jon Uhls murder case has been closed by the Lone Spring police department. Winona has become Rollie’s new partner with the LSPD. At the end of their first day as official partners, Winona asks Rollie if he really believes that a vagrant like Jack Warcloud killed Jon Uhls. Rollie doesn’t have an answer.
That night, Rollie and Carmen have sex. As they lie in bed afterward, Carmen asks Rollie where he thinks Jack Warcloud killed Jon before bringing him to the reservation border. Rollie realizes that the police never revealed that Jon was killed elsewhere and dumped there and he never told Carmen about it. Carmen snuggles up next to Rollie as the realization hits him that Carmen killed Jon all along. Carmen drifts off to sleep in Rollie’s arms as he is paralyzed by uncertainty of what to do with the information he just realized.
No comments:
Post a Comment