Get John Malkovich that Oscar after his triumphant turn in Wild Horse Nine
Not many people could deliver a sharp, thoughtful and yet accessible and genuinely funny film, examining the US government’s involvement in the violent 1973 coup that overthrew Chile’s democratically elected president. And all without the whiff of a stale history lesson.
But Martin McDonagh can – and what’s more, he’ll cast the idiosyncratic John Malkovich in one of the best roles he’s had in years too.
And he’ll also nab an impressive 14-minute standing ovation at Venice Film Festival while doing it.
The follow-up to his Oscar-losing (but nine-time nominated) The Banshees of Inisherin, Wild Horse Nine presents a familiar McDonagh odd-couple pairing of an old-timer with a younger associate.
This time, they happen to both be CIA agents stationed in Santiago, Chile, played by Malkovich and Sam Rockwell, who are dispatched to the remote paradise of Easter Island and its near-1,000 famous stone statues (Wild Horse Nine is one of few films to ever shoot there).
Malkovich’s Chris is cynical and frustrated, experiencing regrets about what he’s done in the past as part of his job and moaning to Rockwell’s Lee about most things an awful lot. And when Chris befriends a couple of rebellious students on the island (Mariana di Girolamo and Ailín Salas), things threaten to go dangerously sideways.
McDonagh’s brain should be marvelled at because, while this favoured character dynamic of his is very similar to his first film, 2008’s In Bruges, in particular, he’s conjured up another richly unique setting and entertaining set of characters here.
He also writes brilliantly for actors, even veterans like 72-year-old Malkovich, who’s played everything from to the Pope and a criminal hijacker to a seductive French aristocrat and a fictionalised version of himself.
Rockwell returns, having won the 2018 Academy Award for best supporting actor in McDonagh’s Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, and worked with him on Broadway. The pair clearly vibe well and Rockwell is great as ever here as the often exasperated Lee.
But Malkovich has the meatiest role to devour, turning in a hilarious but heartfelt performance as a cranky but petulant loose cannon. He monologues on moths, insists their boss is a heroin addict, tells British tourists he was ‘always on Ireland’s side’ and freely announces that he and Lee are agents working to destabilise Chile’s democracy.
In other words, he’s chaos incarnate, but there’s a lot bubbling underneath his cranky exterior.
‘Don’t pull rank on me, I’ve been killing people since before you were born,’ he snaps at Lee at one point, which is a large part of his problem. Chris is also threatening to write a memoir, which, given that he lists previous CIA missions including Guatemala in 1954, Congo in 1960 and the ‘less successful’ Bay of Pigs in 1961 as key milestones, is of quite the concern to MJ. And that’s before we even get to ‘Dallas ‘63’ and Wild Horse Nine’s ongoing suggestion of covert intelligence operations being involved with JFK’s assassination.
But Chris and Lee’s squabbling belies their long-established, quite tender in places relationship.
The steady supply of jokes and ridiculousness never cheapens Wild Horse Nine’s political message either, which has only become more relevant since McDonagh wrote it, following the US’s strike on Venezuela and subsequent capture of President Nicolás Maduro in January 2026.
Wild Horse Nine will release in UK and US cinemas on November 6.
It pokes fun in places, but in intelligent, searching ways.
McDonagh is also on top form with his flawless dialogue, perhaps unsurprising given his playwriting background, as well as his seemingly effortless stream of genuinely hilarious jokes.
The film, which co-stars Parker Posey as Lee’s boozy wife Marge – a little underutilised in her purely phone acting role – is also likely to inspire plenty of people to walk around declaring ‘bon f**king voyage,’ as Buscemi’s angry MJ does.
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