“Killers of the Flower Moon: Martin Scorsese’s Epic Retelling of the Osage Massacre”

At the Cannes Film Festival, Martin Scorseses got Killers of the Flower Moon, with Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro, a warm welcome. The film puts a forgotten mass murder of the Osage people back in the spotlight.

Native Americans are virtually invisible in American visual culture, but when they do get screen time, they usually portray the miserable conditions they have to live in today. That is why the first minutes of Martin Scorsese’s 27th feature film are Killers of the Flower Moon so startling: we see elegantly dressed members of the Osage nation driving around in expensive cars, their pockets filled with dollars, brushing off pushy white vendors in the street.

The opposite world? It used to be true. A century ago, the Osage were for a time the richest people in the world per capita: the piece of land in Oklahoma allocated to them by the government turned out to be brimming with oil. It turned out to be a poisoned gift for the Osage, because when wealth just spouts out of the ground, it also attracts those with bad intentions.

People like businessman William Hale (played by Robert De Niro in the film), a manipulative, materialistic two-bag who came up with a ruthless plan to do away with the Osage and put their money in his pockets. The atrocities committed by Hale and his accomplices were forgotten for nearly a hundred years, until journalist David Grann brought them back to life in his non-fiction book Killers of the Flower Moon.

The film that Scorsese made on the basis of this departs from Grann’s journalistic approach: the book builds up to the exposure of the perpetrators by the FBI, the film almost immediately points in the direction of Hale and his gang. As is often the case, Scorsese tells the story through the eyes of the villains. But more than in iconic gangster movies like Goodfellas is in it Killers of the Flower Moon also room to feel the grief of their victims.

Scorsese focuses on Ernest Burkhart: a lazy bum, matchlessly played by a Leonardo DiCaprio stripped of all vanity. As William Hale’s nephew, he carries out his murderous orders without thinking twice. The astonishing (and historically accurate) twist: Like many other white men who claim the Osage fortune, Ernest is also married to an Osage woman. But unlike those other men, he genuinely loves his Mollie (spiritual role by Lily Gladstone), and she loves him. Their relationship is the heart of the film and a source of suspense: how long will Ernest maintain the moral straddle between his love for Mollie and the murder of her family? And will Mollie discover Ernest’s betrayal?

With a playing time of almost 3.5 hours, Scorsese has after The Irishman once again made a film of monumental proportions. You feel that time Killers of the Flower Moon really pass. Certainly around the middle, the film lacks some form and panache. At the same time, this enormous playing time is also necessary to make the scope and perversity of this tragedy tangible. As if Scorsese zooms out very slowly, until finally you can contemplate in horror the scope of Hale’s plan, and the merciless patience it took to execute it.

Killers of the Flower Moon was one of the most anticipated films at Cannes, and those high expectations were met: press and audience went wild. “The warm welcome here in Cannes is very special,” said actress Lily Gladstone, who grew up on the Blackfeet reservation in Montana, at the press conference the day after the premiere. “But it mostly feels like justice.”

In addition to Gladstone, DiCaprio, De Niro and Scorsese, Geoffrey Standing Bear, chief of the Osage people, also spoke at the press conference. “When I first met Martin Scorsese, I asked him how he wanted to approach this story. He told me, ‘I’m going to tell a story about trust. Between Mollie and Ernest, but also between the outside world and the Osage. And about the deep betrayal of that trust.’” Scorsese nods, “We wanted Ernest to personify that tragedy of trust and betrayal between the Osage and white Americans.”

“My people have suffered greatly,” says Chief Standing Bear, “and bear the consequences of that betrayal to this day. But I can say on behalf of the Osage that Martin Scorsese and his team have restored confidence. And we are confident that it will not be put to shame this time.”

Scorsese and co. not only wanted to tell the story of the Osage, they wanted to do the same with them. They attended rituals, banquets, celebrations and listened extensively to their stories. “We approached this story almost like anthropologists,” says DiCaprio. Lily Gladstone adds: “I think what we’ve created transcends the anthropological. Native peoples are used to anthropologists coming to study us. But who but artists can challenge people to think about their own complicity in white supremacy?”

“This film exposes the banality of evil,” says Robert De Niro. “That is what we must always be vigilant about. You see it happening today, too, with… Everyone knows who I’m talking about, but I’m not going to say his name. So it’s something systemic, that’s what makes it so scary.”

Killers of the Flower Moon will hit theaters and Apple TV+ this fall