No surprise that Ben Wheatley’s version of a Fargo-esque midwest comedy is a blood-soaked shoot ’em up affair ala his blistering shooter Free Fire. With Normal, he teams up with Bob Odenkirk and his Nobody writer Derek Kolstad for a roaring action flick full of yakuza assassins, a wayward moose, a dead sheriff, and the best meatloaf in the state of Minnesota. The film is a roller coaster, and further cements Odenkirk as the best everyman hero in the business right now. It’s taken me a while to be won over by him, but won over I am definitely am.
Odenkirk plays Ulysses, the interim sheriff in the small town of Normal, MN, population 1890. It’s a place where the local bar is decorated with walls and walls of loaded shotguns. In this sleepy place, the worst dispute Ulysses has to contend with is the occasional argument, or the local spinstress getting the wrong color thread. Or so you’d think. The previous sheriff died under shady circumstances. The police station has enough weapons to fight a small war. Something’s up. And when a pair of bank robbers stumble into the dark underbelly of Normal, they unleash Hell that Ulysses, a man running from a tragic event in his past and failed marriage, is the only one capable of stopping.
Considering that Kolstad is also the creator of John Wick, you have a pretty good idea what’s gonna go down. The kicker is that Normal isn’t nearly as slick as that, and a lot sillier than even Nobody, bristling with a Hot Fuzz-esque energy that Odenkirk is perfectly suited to. When the entire town, like literally the entire population, turns against Ulysses the bullets start flying and they never really stop. But these aren’t trained killers. They’re bartenders, mailmen, and shopkeepers, so it’s just absolute chaos as everyone is tripping over themselves to kill Ulysses before the yakuza show up and slaughter the whole town.
Wheatley is adept at managing this level of carnage and a surprisingly large ensemble that includes Henry Winkler as the town mayor, Jess McLeod as the former mayor’s estranged daughter, an ex-military vet you just know is going to bring the pain,and Lena Headey as a bar owner who sees right through Ulysses’ reluctant hero act. The violence encompasses a lot more than just gunfights, too. Wheatley’s dark comedy chops come through with a variety of stabbings, explosions, the occasional auto mishap, and death by meat tenderizer. If Normal wasn’t Wheatley pulling out all of the stops to shock you, well, that would be pretty abnormal.
