NOW IN THEATERS! Directed by brothers Eshom Nelms and Ian Nelms, the action thriller Red Right Hand features a man in Appalachia named Cash (Orlando Bloom) taking on well-funded small-town evil. That evil is embodied by a crime boss lady known as Big Cat (Andie MacDowell), who runs drugs and owns the local police department. Cash has a history with Big Cat but has turned away from that life to work a farm with his brother Finney (Scott Haze) and his niece Savannah (Chapel Oaks).
When it comes out that Finney is in debt to Big Cat, she demands that Cash come back to work for her, with Savannah’s life on the line as collateral. He is faced with an impossible decision and does come back to Big Cat to protect his family. When he finds his moral ambiguity only stretches so far, he enlists the help of another townie, Wilder (Garret Dillahunt), to push back on Big Cat and her crew. Wilder was also once on the wrong side of the law but has cleaned up and is now the church pastor. He is still capable of stepping into the chaos with Cash. Big Cat is enraged that she can’t control Cash, and has allowed that anger to cloud her judgment. When the (literal) smoke clears, who will be left standing, and how much damage has been done?
“…Big Cat…demands that Cash come back to work for her, with Savannah’s life on the line as collateral.”
Red Right Hand fully delivers in the action realm, right down to realistic management of ammunition, which is often overlooked, especially for semi-automatic weapons. Ten shots or so, and you’re out, and that fact plays into the action here as a plot point.
The title Red Right Hand is epic. So much so, in fact, that one feels it may have better served a higher-budget, more serious film instead of a B movie hillbilly shoot-em-up. You may recognize it as the Nick Cave song played over the opening credits of Peaky Blinders. The phrase originates as a stanza in Milton’s Paradise Lost, summoning up a powerful image of Satan: “What if the breath that kindled those grim fires / Awaked, should blow them into sevenfold rage / And plunge us in the flames; or from above / Should intermitted vengeance arm again / His red right hand to plague us?” That’s grandiose for this film, but it works.
"…fully delivers in the action realm..."
