Discuss the book

[arnzilla]

SPOILERS WELCOME

[gabriel]

Thanks for creating the thread, Arnzilla. Haven't read it, but I'm tempted, we'll see.

[archer6749!]

I am interested in seeing Leo play Ernest. I read the book before they announced the character change on his part so I was more focused on Tom White solving the case rather than the husband of Mollie but now I'm going to go back and reread it. If there is anyone here who hasn't read the book yet and has a question about any of the characters I'm up to answer them.

[peanut80]

Thanks for creating the thread, Arnz

I have read the book ,and in my speculation, whereas the book was told from White's point of view as he investigated the crimes, I think Scorsese's version will be told from the viewpoint of Mollie and Ernest as these events happen around them and White enters the picture

Mollie and her family , as well as, Ernest will be more flushed out characters

I'm personally very happy that DiCaprio switched to playing the conflicted character of Ernest

[MovieFan]

Having read the book I think I know how this film will end and it could make the film an unofficial trilogy with SILENCE & THE IRISHMAN.

There's a short segment late in the book dealing with what happens to everyone after the crimes and it covers Ernest Burkhart, released from jail, returning to Osage County. Everyone knows the terrible atrocities he was a part of. Ernest, now old and alone, tries to reconnect with his now grown up children and they want nothing to do with him. They reject him being a part of their lives and if I remember right I think he just lives out the rest of his life alone and unwanted.

I can see Scorsese mining gold out of this similar to how he did in the epilogues of SILENCE & THE IRISHMAN. If the epilogue of SILENCE was a man growing old holding onto his faith but rejected by his old world for one act, THE IRISHMAN was a man growing old and alone because of how he chose to live his life, I could see KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON ending with Ernest growing old and alone rejected by the racist white community and his Osage family for committing terrible acts. That some sins truly are unforgivable.

I'm very excited to see how Scorsese is going to handle this! I think it'll be similar to THE IRISHMAN in that while the film will excel in the genre it's in (a Western) it's really going to be another quieter and contemplative work of his.

Can't wait to see it in.... late 2022 I guess?

[archer6749!]

I don't think they would be going as far as showing the people decades after the murders happened. I imagine them ending the movie after the trials ends and having end notes explaining what happens to each person. When I read Ernest Burkhart's (Leo's character) parts in the book I saw him come off as more of a weak person and I can imagine seeing a movie where he's not really the villain but rather someone that his uncle (DeNiro) manipulates into doing things he really doesn't want to do. Yes he was aware who was doing the killings and yes he did rob is sister-in-law when he got out of jail, but I do believe on some level he did care for his wife Mollie and according to the book he changed his story back to guilty again after the death of their daughter because he didn't want to put Mollie through anymore than what she had already been put through.

[peanut80]

Moviefan

As to Ernest and his kids, I saw a parallel between Ernest and his son Cowboy and Ernest and Hale. Ernest granddaughter Maggie mentioned that while his daughter Elizabeth wanted nothing to do with him , that Cowboy visited him several times after he was released from prison, and she felt it was because even though he didn't condone in anyway what his father did , he still longed for a father. Plus I would think that Cowboy did have good memories of his father as a boy before he became aware of the other side of his father, and it was those good memories that kept him connected to this man ,who was still at the end of the day, the only father he had

I think that was ,also, true of Ernest, as while we the reader sees no redeeming qualities about Hale, but to Ernest , who viewed him as a surrogate father, I'm sure there were some good memories he had of Hale that made it harder to just totally separate from him beyond just fear of him


Archer

I agree , I would think the movie will more likely end with trial, but , who knows, Scorsese may show a small montage of Ernest in later years sitting alone while informing viewers of what happened to the principals post trial

Similar to you, I did feel that Ernest had developed true feeling for Mollie. He may have entered into Hale's inheritance scheme without true feelings at first, but as time progressed and they had children together /he spent time with her and her family, he did truly come to care for her

I often wondered if he had thought as time went along as long as he kept quiet , Hale would not harm Mollie or his children, but when he learned that his baby daughter had been poisoned that is when he finally realized that Hale valued his children no more than any stranger who obstructed him from getting what he wanted

[gabriel]

I didn't know where to post this. I didn't know about the connection to this film:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CPGeR0HL-sz

The trailer mentions the murders too:

[gabriel]

So I watched this yesterday, the Oklahoma story was like a mini-movie inside the movie. It's around a half hour condensation of the story, in a two hours and a half film. There were comedy bits about some of the millionaire Natives' extravagances with the money, before the murders started occurrring. Molly was referred to by her real name, but not shown, and William Hale and Ernest were characters in it, albeit under different names. The undercover identities of the agents working in the area were cleverly presented. And there will also have to be plenty of digital enhancing in Marty's film for the oil towers in town, which here appeared to have been built. What's telling about this is to realize that as early as the late fifties or early sixties, Scorsese has been aware of the Osage murders story, at least through this film, which he listed in a random pleasures list in the late 70's for Film Comment. It was a long list of films in random order that he described by saying: "On the whole, these films are not good. They’re guilty. But there are things in them that make you like them, that make them worthwhile." The FBI Story was on that list.