Rebel Ridge

But while Rebel Ridge comes as a surprise, it’s certainly a welcome one. That it was written and directed by Jeremy Saulnier, who made a name for himself with the ultraviolent Blue Ruin and Green Room, will give viewers familiar with his prior work certain expectations — many of which are subverted. Netflix is forgoing a theatrical release for this original title, which is available to stream today. Like its protagonist, a former Marine wronged by a small-town police department, Rebel Ridge is ultimately nonlethal — which isn’t to say that it doesn’t pack a punch.

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Consider one of its most breakneck sequences, which consists of little more than a tense conversation, slow wifi, and the revelation of an acronym’s meaning. By the time we find out what those five letters stand for, one half of that conversation has been disarmed and thrown to the ground. A number of similar scenes follow, and the inventiveness with which Terry (Aaron Pierre) neutralizes his corrupt foes without killing them never gets old.

It helps that he’s entirely justified. The film opens with him riding his bike when two police officers pull him over and immediately accuse him of a crime he didn’t commit. He remains calm and respectful throughout, not that they make it easy on him. We soon learn that Terry is on his way to post bail for his cousin, which becomes impossible when the officers seize the cash he’s carrying and send him on his way — something they’re legally allowed to do without even charging him with a crime.

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Rebel Ridge belongs to the same tradition as Walking Tall and First Blood: movies about good men in bad situations who are pushed to their breaking point by corrupt officials. Terry, like his genre forebears, just wants to go about his business and be left alone. When that’s no longer possible, he fights back and makes everyone involved wish they never crossed him. Pierre’s quiet intensity is perfect for the role, his steely gaze and soft-spoken nature making it clear that, though he never wanted this fight, he’s more than willing to finish it.

Terry does everything he can to end it, they do everything they can to escalate it.

The brinkmanship is a constant back-and-forth between the two sides, with each landing hits here and there as the conflict goes beyond the point of peaceful resolution. Terry does everything he can to end it, they do everything they can to escalate it.

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That same mix of restraint and explosiveness can be seen in Saulnier’s filmmaking. It’s as though, after the shocking-but-not-gratuitous violence of his earlier films, he specifically set out to remove what could be seen as a crutch from his toolbox and figure out a new, more inventive way for his action sequences to play out. The result is his most mature work to date, one anchored by a John Wick-esque hero who relies on his fists rather than weapons and is all the more compelling for it. The motto of a Marine program to which Terry belonged is “one mind, any weapon,” a philosophy that Rebel Ridge makes good on and then some. Like him, the movie will knock you out; unlike him, it’ll be in a good way.