Watch Latest THE HATEFUL EIGHT Featurettes Before You See It In Theaters Dec. 31st

Director Quentin Tarantino’s THE HATEFUL EIGHT is now playing in select theaters in “glorious 70mm” (including St. Louis) and will open nationwide on December 31, 2015.

Of this ensemble cast, which includes Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Walton Goggins, Demian Bichir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern and Channing Tatum, the one standout is the performance by Jennifer Jason Leigh.

Leigh comments on her character’s place among the eight: “Daisy is a gutsy girl, and she’s a bit of an animal in her own way. But all of these people have their values, and they all have their soft spots.”

“Jennifer Jason Leigh is fearless,” producer Stacey Sher says. “She’ll go anywhere, she’ll try anything, she’ll push it all the way, and as a result her character is constantly surprising throughout the entire journey.”

In THE HATEFUL EIGHT, set six or eight or twelve years after the Civil War, a stagecoach hurtles through the wintry Wyoming landscape. The passengers, bounty hunter John Ruth (Kurt Russell) and his fugitive Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh), race towards the town of Red Rock where Ruth, known in these parts as “The Hangman,” will bring Domergue to justice.

Along the road, they encounter two strangers: Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson), a black former union soldier turned infamous bounty hunter, and Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins), a southern renegade who claims to be the town’s new Sheriff. Losing their lead on the blizzard, Ruth, Domergue, Warren and Mannix seek refuge at Minnie’s Haberdashery, a stagecoach stopover on a mountain pass.

When they arrive at Minnie’s, they are greeted not by the proprietor but by four unfamiliar faces. Bob (Demian Bichir), who’s taking care of Minnie’s while she’s visiting her mother, is holed up with Oswaldo Mobray (Tim Roth), the hangman of Red Rock, cow-puncher Joe Gage (Michael Madsen), and Confederate General Sanford Smithers (Bruce Dern). As the storm overtakes the mountainside stopover, our eight travelers come to learn they may not make it to Red Rock after all…

In his review, Jim Batts says the film is “enthralling, outrageous, and ambitious.”

Photos: Andrew Cooper, SMPSP / © 2015 The Weinstein Company. All Rights Reserved.