Her son Robbie (Lucas Hedges), who has tried to bury his grief for his sister, threatens to join the disapproving chorus. But Mildred remains immovable, even as the town shows its support for the well-liked, family-man police chief.
When that fails to sway her, he reveals he has late-stage cancer. Willoughby tries to reason with Mildred by sharing his frustration about the absence of leads in the case. “Looks like we got a war on our hands,” mutters Willoughby ( Harrelson in a role that fits him like a glove) to his horse, after Mildred, dressed for battle in a bandana and coveralls, appears on local TV news to restate her beef with the police.
The billboards are on a road barely used since the freeway was put in, but police officer Dixon - a violent, racist doofus for the ages in Rockwell’s wildly undignified performance - happens to drive by them on Easter Sunday, while the glue is still wet.
Following a rudimentary check of the legal restrictions on billboard advertising, she has three signs put up, their blunt messages in boldface uppercase on a blood-red background reading, in order: Raped While Dying And Still No Arrests How Come, Chief Willoughby? It’s been months since Mildred heard a word from cops about the investigation of her teenage daughter’s horrific rape and murder by incineration, so she takes radical steps to light a flame under the ass of local law enforcement. Fox Searchlight has a real ripper on its hands with this one, even if it likely won’t be for mainstream tastes. A stupendous showcase for the formidable gifts of McDormand that also provides plum roles for Woody Harrelson and Sam Rockwell, this is a corrosively humorous drama of festering injustice, Shakespearean rage, grave reckoning and imperfect redemption, which unfolds with the epic dimensions of a classic Western showdown. After the entertainingly larkish but low-caloric carnage of Seven Psychopaths, McDonagh returns here to the peak form of his debut feature In Bruges, and of his best work for the stage.
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