Rent Devil in the Dust (2025)

Odd Supernatural Western - Devil in the Dust review by GI

Clearly influenced by Jim Jarmusch's 1995 western Dead Man this is a strange supernatural story set before the American Civil War in the wilds of Arizona. Guy Pearce plays an ether addicted doctor who is grieving for his dead family who have died of plague. Needing money he agrees to help a former slave (DeWanda Wise) take her young daughter across the wilderness to see a famed priest. This is all because if the girl, who is inexplicably white and blonde, touches anyone or thing they instantly die and the mother believes she is possessed. On the journey they have to deal with a variety of characters and there's plenty of violence along the way too. It's a difficult film to quantify and it did remind me a little of Bone Tomahawk (2015) too. Pearce gives his usual angsty performance and Bill Pullman and Joanna Cassidy pop up in support roles. Visually it's a western, narratively it's a somewhat weird horror film about superstition and fear. It's watchable if a little odd.