Hot off the heels of the overrated, undeserving Oscar winner of last year (Birdman), Alejandro G. Iñárritu and Emmanuel Lubezki strike gold with their Tarkovsky tribute Platoon adaptation - I mean, frontier survival film, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy and Domnhall Gleeson.

The most talked about aspect of this film is Leonardo DiCaprio's performance in context of the "most difficult" shooting conditions. Is this the film that will finally bring him home the Oscar for Best Actor? If I had my way, the answer would be no. Leo has had the bad luck of being nominated in years with better performances given. This year is no different. Many mistake grimacing and screaming while flecks of spit fly from one's mouth for good acting. "Have you heard that the vegetarian DiCaprio ate a raw fish and liver in The Revenant?!" This clever hype behind the film implanted the idea that acting in the cold and eating raw animal equates to good acting, which may lead to pressure on the Academy to finally award Leo his Oscar, but hopefully they don't. Why? Because DiCaprio most certainly has an Oscar-worthy performance in him, it's just not this one. Robert De Niro put it best in this interview, concerning 'overacting' in film: "It’s simpler than you think… It’s very hard for actors. I get caught up in that myself, where you have to do more, do something and you don’t have to do anything." DiCaprio is stuck in acting purgatory, not quite method acting, and not quite using a simplistic but ultimately effective technique like De Niro suggests. DiCaprio could have easily toned down his performance to just the top half of his face, and create an even more potent performance - why do you think that last shot was so effective? It was a face of a man with an ambiguous expression on his face, stressing implication for the audience to place their own interpretation on the character - an example of an editless pseudo-Kuleshov Effect.

On the other hand, Tom Hardy should easily win Best Supporting actor. His performance is absolutely stunning, a transformative role where the gruff and quiet London man becomes a different person entirely. His accent is great, as usual, his physical performance is stellar and the hair and makeup department gave visual depth to his character. In fact, Fitzgerald is a more interesting, three-dimensional character than Hugh Glass, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. As put by the late great Roger Ebert:

"Each film is only as good as its villain. Since the heroes and the gimmicks tend to repeat from film to film, only a great villain can transform a good try into a triumph."

And so, Dicaprio's earnest performance for a relatively simple character combined with Hardy's excellent performance for a fascinating if repulsive 'villain' do create a tension that moves the film along. As mentioned earlier, the production on the film, namely hair and makeup departments did stellar work, playing a large part in the performances of the actors.

Moving onto the technical aspects of the film, Lubezki as usual does a great job of doing Lubezki: long-takes, roaming wide angle shots, the occasional beautifully composed static shot. He also seems to have really discovered water in 2015, as the perplexing Knight Of Cups and The Revenant have strong symbolism in relation to water. This style compliments the material well, as action sequences are made more brutal and realistic, and slow survival sequences more monotonous and frustrating. In combination with Ryuichi Sakamoto's phenomenal soundtrack which creates an icy cold ambient soundscape reflecting the visual reality of the film, a strong tone is well set.

The thematic elements of the film also play well, with a strong sense of spirituality weaved in to the narrative. Race and violence, man and nature are at the forefront in a film that attempts to capture the spirit of it's historical period. French, English and Native Americans live in uneasy and violent harmony, setting the stage for what we know as the United States Of America. The film reminds those who have the tendency to believe in American exceptionalism that really it's a country descended from natives and Europeans violently coming together - nothing less, nothing more.

Ironically, the weakest element of the film is part of the most talked about - DiCaprio's performance as Hugh Glass. Though the performance may not warrant an Oscar, it's still a very strong performance for a surprisingly underdeveloped character. Revenge as a singular motivating factor for a character could work very well, however in The Revenant, there is an attempt to portray Glass and his interactions with his now dead family through meditative flashbacks which fails to provide the sufficient emotional impact it deserves. This is the one problem in a film where nearly every aspect is well-worked with passion, but this begs the question:

Is the film a cohesive whole, or a collection of excellent elements?

I would argue that it does succeed as a cohesive whole - a spiritual tale of revenge in a hostile habitat, where interactions between men, as well as nature, are simplified, but in no way less brutal. Iñárritu and his team's clear dedication to the making of this film shows, as the seemingly excessive runtime of two and a half hours flies by in a tense and layered drama.