God Is A Bullet releases on Digital beginning July 11.
“Boston Teran” isn’t a real name. I haven’t looked into this person’s life too much and I reckon there won’t be much to find past his Wikipedia page. The bio included in the press kit does offer some intriguing factoids about our pen-named author here though, citing him as Bronx-born and having come from an Italian family of “gamblers, con men, number runners, and thieves,” and a travel history and experience that has gradually fueled his writing.
For this, it’s worth considering he’s had more than plenty reason to retain his anonymity, given the research he must have completed, looking into real-life events that supplemented his debut novel, “God Is A Bullet” back in 1999. To add, I can only wonder what the conversations must have been like between Teran, the parties involved, and filmmaker Nick Cassavetes, if those talks even occured. At any rate, Cassavetes has proven himself amply behind the lens has he has in front of it since taking off as an actor in the 70s and onward, and after directing eight films all ranging in different genres and textures, he’s gone and went for the jugular this year, adapting Teran’s freshman novel for his ninth feature film now available from Wayward Entertainment.
God Is A Bullet puts viewers through the ringer for much of its 150-minute duration, unleashing the fury and horror with a junkie named Case (Maika Monroe) going through withdrawal at a halfway house, followed by footage of the brazen daylight kidnapping of a young girl by a gang of tattooed satanic cultists. We later meet Bob Hightower (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), a detective who in the morning after speaking to his daughter Gabi (Chloe Guy) over the phone, comes to find his ex-wife murdered along with her new husband, and Gabi missing.
With little to go by except for a few clues, the case ultimately finds now ex-detective Bob and a reluctant Case joining forces, venturing into the desert and down the rabbit hole, and into the dark, violent and unforgiving world where rhe sadistic Cyrus (Karl Glusman) and his vicious gang awaits. It’s only a matter of time before Cyrus’s inchoate paranoia escalates, but not before Bob and Case get a leg up in a gripping development of their search, placing them squarely before an opportune moment where imminent finality is the calm before the storm, and Bob and Case are forced into an armed last stand against Cyrus and his evil gang.
God Is A Bullet is longer than what most directors deliver in the average limited theatrical/digital release, although best believe that Cassavetes makes the most of every minute. The movie can be a little unnerving at times as well, especially in a few scenes that will instantly send you places, mentally. Cassavetes proves to be more than adept at handling the source material for such a heavy-handed crime thriller of this caliber, with a strong lead in Coster-Waldau, and the magnetic Monroe striking chords of empathy in her performance through and through.
Monroe’s portrayal of Case, especially, takes you through all the crucual phases there are for the kind of person who has literally been through physically-tangible Hell and back after years of being caught in Cyrus’s undertow. It makes you wonder just what it took for her to dig as far and deep as she did to choose to retread former ground, given all the potential triggers that are there. The biggest test of this factor comes when she infiltrates Cyrus gang after a blow to the face sees her incapacitated and eventually forced to test her resolve. I won’t go into what happens, but I had to pause my screener for a little while just to take it all in. Earnestly, it speaks highly to her progression in this harrowing thriller as you’ll come to find this film to be just as much as her story as it is Bob’s.
The pairing here between our two protagonists also places the key subject matter of faith and religion front and center; It’s Bob whose God-fearing ideals are tenaciously tested during this ordeal, while inevitably confronting his own penchant for judgementality when it comes to someone less-acquiescent to faith and religion as Case is. The brilliance here is that in no way does this diminishes just how pivotal Case is in this story. The very crux of this film boils down to a singular discussion between Bob and Case about God as a metaphysical conceptual force versus God in more tangible iteration, like verbs, or nouns – a thing she pulls out of her pocket which she dons as “the ultimate lifeform… the great equalizer.”
As far as nouns go, God Is A Bullet plays it up handsomely and brutally in the film’s key moments of action and violence. The gore never lets up when it occurs, as with characters who get killed, and they’re not just shot or stabbed. They are executed on the spot. Throats are slit. Heads are shot clean off at point-blank range, including one with a shotgun during a scuffle. One character is shot just multiple times before her stomach explodes out of the front after taking a shotgun to the back. One antagonist is shot three times in the face before taking another round squarely between the eyes. Another character is shot almost thirty times in the face both while and after they fall to the ground. There’s also a brisk tête-à-tête between Bob and the business end of some asshole’s flamethrower. The movie also bears some gruesome depictions of ritualistic harm, and rape – particularly the latter well near the top of the film.
A good deal of this is intended to speak gravely to just how evil Cyrus is. He’s the type that can’t let go once a seed is planted causing him to think he’ll be betrayed even if it wasn’t true. He’s also the type that’ll drug up a rattlesnake and send it packing to take someone out he disapproves of. He’s as dogmatically demonic and evil as you would expect any villain of his tambre. He sees himself as free to an almost otherworldly level where he’s beyond any accountability and judgement, and imbued so far as to drive his kills home by telling his victims “you’re crossing over.” The fucking audacity, I tell you…
I don’t have much to say about actor Jamie Foxx in this movie. That’s not to say anything degrading of his performance here as “The Ferryman”, a tattoo artist and healer entrenched in the desert where he’s pretty much his own boss and doesn’t take any shit. It’s definitely a role that other actors just as talented as Foxx could have played, but it’s certainly Foxx who markedly brings value and potency to the film’s casting line-up, along with his usual authenticity coupled with his character’s discernible look and design.
The film also stars January Jones, Paul Johansson and Arthur Naci in a story adjacent to the film’s principal events, paving the way for elements of betrayal, and corruption all connected to a land deal gone awry. Revenge isn’t entirely circular here, however. Bob is unceremoniously forced to choose just how much blood he wants to taste as someone who isn’t quite sure of how full he is. At the end of the film, however, what God Is A Bullet really boils down to on matters of vindication and justice depends on how you weigh the volume of what our two very different characters endured, while discovering one another, and themselves. Whether or not God had anything to do with it, by any measure or definition, is anyone’s guess.
Filmmakers like Park Chan-wook (Old Boy), Kim Jee-woon (I Saw The Devil), James Wan (Death Sentence) and S. Craig Zahler (Brawl At Cell Block 99), and even Ric Roman Waugh (Shot Caller) bode as noteworthy comparisons if punishing crime thrillers seething with retribution and a glimmer of redemption are your thing. Alas, you can’t go wrong with God Is A Bullet. I’d wager that between this and the Road House remake Cassavetes was supposed to direct at one point, while I would have taken either, I’m more than satisfied he chose this project instead.