Dust (2001)

21% of critics liked it
(14 reviews)
57% of users liked it
(1,502 ratings)

Love and war divide two brothers in a drama from award-winning director Milcho Manchevski, his first since his acclaimed 1994 debut Pred Dozhdot. After an elderly woman (Rosemary Murphy) gets the better of a burglar (Adrian Lester) who has broken into her apartment, she decides to tell him a story… More Love and war divide two brothers in a drama from award-winning director Milcho Manchevski, his first since his acclaimed 1994 debut Pred Dozhdot. After an elderly woman (Rosemary Murphy) gets the better of a burglar (Adrian Lester) who has broken into her apartment, she decides to tell him a story about her family to give him a perspective on an individual's legacy to their family. Luke (David Wenham) and Elijah (Joseph Fiennes) are brothers and cowboys in the American West near the turn of the century. Luke and Elijah are both in love with Lilith (Anne Brochet), a woman who works in an upscale brothel, and when Elijah marries her, it puts a permanent rift in his relationship with his brother. Luke leaves the country and travels to Macedonia, where he becomes involved with a group of resistance fighters who are trying to topple Turkish occupation of their land; a skilled gunman, Luke soon becomes a valuable member of the Macedonian nationalist forces, and falls in love with Neda (Nikolina Kujac), a woman fighting alongside the loyalists. However, Luke discovers he can't entirely leave his past behind when he discovers Elijah has become a hired gun who has joined the Turkish forces. Dust was the opening night attraction at the 2001 Venice Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

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Rating, Runtime: R, 2 hr. 7 min.
Directed By: Milcho Manchevski
Written By: Milcho Manchevski
Genres: Western, Drama, Romance, Art House & International

In Theaters: Jan 1, 2003 Wide
On DVD: Nov 11, 2003
Studio: Lions Gate Films

Critic Reviews

Megan Lehmann, New York Post
The bloodthirsty Dust lurches so wildly and meaninglessly between genres and time frames that all it creates is motion sickness.
Elvis Mitchell, New York Times
Dazzling and dazed.
Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times
Dust is a bust, a big bad movie of the scope, ambition and bravura that could be made only by a talented filmmaker run amok.
Leslie Camhi, Village Voice
In reaching for a cubist style of storytelling, [Manchevski] sacrifices character and motivation.
Christopher Null, Filmcritic.com
our brains are numbed into oblivion
Barbara Goslawski, Boxoffice Magazine
The two eras presented in this film may display similar violent dispositions but ultimately their overriding sensibilities are just too different to integrate.
, E! Online
It's a clumsy, pretentious, dull movie -- the kind that thinks it's way more important than it is.
Maitland McDonagh, TV Guide's Movie Guide
The chaotic, brutal iconography of Italian Westerns is put to novel use in this time-traveling, self-referential, hugely ambitious story.
David Sterritt, Christian Science Monitor
A picture this long and dense should work harder to be cogent and coherent.
Hazel-Dawn Dumpert, L.A. Weekly
Manchevski stumbles headlong into a tangle of mismatched tones and plot points.
Christopher Tookey, Daily Mail [UK]
The film lacks coherent characters, relationships you can care about and an intelligible plot.