Recent Reviews for The Indian Runner
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MCT:March 11, 2008THE INDIAN RUNNER (1991)
directed by Sean Penn
starring David Morse, Viggo Mortensen, Valeria GolinoThe Indian Runner is Sean Penn's directorial debut. Penn has always been an actor with depth taking his acting job very seriously and he does the same as a director telling us this deep and dark story.The Indian Runner is about two brothers who are the absolute opposite of each other, one is the small town sherif and the other one is a Viet-Nam veteran with a bit too much violence inside of him. The older brother tries to bring back - and keep - his brother on the right path but its not easy cause the younger is pretty much of control.
David Morse is fairly good as the sherif older brother, he is somehow touching and makes his character believale while Viggo Mortensen kinda overact portraying the younger one but that character is never likable - and thats the point - with his useless explosion of anger and violence. Valeria Golino and Patria Arquette play their respective wives and even with smaller screen time they mannage to portray a strong woman - Golino - and the mentally challenged girlfriend - Arquette - in the right tone. Dennis Hopper and Charles Bronson compelte the cast with small parts, almost cameo appearances but still they get some effective scenes.
With his film Sean Penn make it a point to show how hard life is - thats why the film moves slowly - but he also tells you that its your own decision to live it this hard cause you can try to see the brither side and forget about the sad things life brings to you. That is in a way what oppose the two brothers, one tries hard to survive and is happy when he sees his family while the other is simply angry and sees bad things everywhere.
This film looks very realistic, from begenning to end, it has a 70's feel in the direction - but its also set right after the Viet-Nam war - with the dirty photography.
Good film, quite emotional but not for everyone. Very raw.
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MCT:January 29, 2008Very tastefully done. Viggo is such an amazing actor! This film definately defines the meaning of the phrase "unconditional love".
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MCT:January 18, 2008
There're not many films that actually moved me, leaving me feeling so strongly about character on screen as if I was looking into the mirror. In fact, there're a few. Sean Penn's brilliant debut, sadly forgotten "The Indian Runner" is one of them and even if he hasn't managed to even come close to this masterpiece in his later work, we should be grateful for this uncompromising journey into confused mind of an isolated human being.
Its simple story - inspired by Bruce Springsteen's song "Highway Patrolman" from his beautiful acoustic "Nebraska" - told with raw honesty and sheer compassion, follow lives of two brothers who presents two sides of a life. First one, Joe (Morse) is leading steady, responsible life, being married and a father, working as a sheriff when second, younger, Frank (Mortensen) is angry, bad-tempered and withdraw, recently sent back home from Vietnam. Upon their first meeting as they driving to see their parents, Frank decides not to see them and go on his own, turning his back on the family for the first time. Frank will turn his back many times and Joe's need to help his younger brother'll turn out to be idle, for, in the end, Frank will go for good...
When their mother passess away and their father later commits suicide - probably out of despair over his loss and fear of living without his female companion - Joe persuade Frank to come back home. Frank agrees to do so but first sight of him in the old place is rather dramatic than happy one as he, drunk out of his mind, stands naked before the mirror with gun in his hand and says the line that will be crucial, emboding chaos within him: "Somebody was boring me. I think it was me." His anti-social behaviour - cold verbal and physical cruelty - first cause him to go to jail after he punches his girlfriend, then, after being released, to humiliate her, spitting with green peas over her face. He also along the way beats up badly a stranger at the bar. Joe does everything he can to help Frank to stand on his own feet - cuts him a break, get him a job, let him move with his girlfriend to their parents' house - but it's a mattter of time before Frank will snap and do something reckless which'll put everything he's build in vain. When his girlfriend is about to give birth to their first child, Frank flees to a bar to his only remaining way of getting relief: in bottle of whiskey.
Frank seems to be young Rimbaud: vibrant, unpredictable, violent, scared and deeply sad - all at the same time - wanting only to get out of this whole - terrifying in its simplicity - system of "being this, doing that" that he actually desires but because of restlessness, not wanting to put himself in this position since escaping then will be much more problematic, he decides not to step into it at all. Feeling all that, it seems abstract to have a family, have a wife, have a job, keeping providing a necessary stability and when you can't seize it and someone ask you why and you can't find right words, it confuses you even more. Joe did everything he could but he didn't understand the state of Frank's mind since he asks: "Why you find it so hard?" on which Frank responds: "Why you find it so easy?!" It's not the lack of Joe's empathy but rather director's statement about our inability to look through the other human being, no matter how well we know him - which is often because we only think we know him well - just the way it is in life. For Joe the whole matter is obvious, there's nothing to be scared of, but for Frank it's a level of living that is beyond his understanding. Behind that, there're only a feelings of regret and shame.
There're many beautiful moments here, one of the most moving I've ever seen. Mutli-character sequence with accompaniment of Jefferson Airplane's wonderful ballad "Comin' Back to Me" is experience you'll remember for the rest of your life. Climax conversation between the two in the bar is another moment of greatness, not easy to forget. 30 years-old Penn's directing is so confident as if he was on the other side of the camera for a least couple of decades and Viggo Mortensen gives a performance of his career.
As Franz Kafka wrote: "Impatience may be the only sin we can commit", and for me, that would be a reason for Frank's escape. But was he bad? "No good"? Penn knows it's not for him to answer that, directly, not only because in life people never are simply good or bad, but because no one would want to be labeled, i.e. jugded in a single word, and so when we see Frank driving off for good, Penn cuts original line from Springsteen's song: "Frank just ain't no good" leaving only "Frank just...", and it's gracious.
Cassavetes would be proud. -
MCT:January 17, 2008
Great Penn movie with two amazing actors doing some of their best work... oh yeah, and one God (Bronson) taking a hiatus from ass kicking to give an amazing performance. It's awesome how Penn uses great actors the world has forgotten about (Bronson, Mickey Rourke and Michael O Keefe in The Pledge, Morse at the time) and gets the performances of a lifetime out of them. A great story about 2 brothers with different mindsets and ideals. And Bronson is in it!
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MCT:October 1, 2007Outstanding character driven drama with an amazing cast involving two brothers with very different views of life. Emotionally moving due to the impressive performances and brilliant dialogue, the movie is powerful as it is depressing. An incredible directorial achievement by Sean Penn!!
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MCT:September 30, 2007
A very depressing directorial debut from Sean Penn. Heavy-handed and rife with symbolism, as we have only learned to expect from Hollywood's anti-hero. Based on a Springsteen song, the story follows two brothers who couldn't be more different through their reunion after one's service in Vietnam. Excellent acting all around, especially from Viggo Mortensen in his first lead role, what surely would have been his "breakthrough" if the film had been seen by more people. Benecio Del Toro makes a single-line cameo appearance, speaking only in Spanish.
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MCT:July 31, 2007Gezien op oudejaarsnacht, met anderhalve kilogram vast en vloeibaar feestgedruis in mijn maag, zo omstreeks 4.00u. Ik heb mijn oogjes maar een half uurtje dicht gehouden tijdens de nogal trage inleiding van de film, maar was fris genoeg om de ontknoping mee te maken.
Bijgevolg zal ik geen al te zwaar oordeel vellen over deze film, al moet ik eerlijkheidshalve toegeven dat het hele verhaal me nogal koud liet. Ik zou hem beter nog eens bekijken? Waar ik wel zeker van ben, is dat ik Viggo Mortensen een slecht acteur vind, en dat dat altijd zo zal blijven. -
MCT:July 14, 2007
See it because Sean Penn did a hell of a good job on direction.
See this before Viggo Mortensen became a mythological creature. (See him also in Prince of Darkness...tasty!)
See this because the restrained character portrayal by David Morse is brilliant. -
MCT:June 15, 2007Here you have a good movie and a very good actors, and Viggo is of course suburb and of course you see some nude(viggo)
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MCT:April 26, 2007
Ett sant mästerverk som känns långt in i ryggmärgen. Sean Penn visar sig behärska filmmakeri-konsten lika väl som han behärskar skådespelarkonsten. En auteur i ordets rätta bemärkelse. Viggo Mortensen och David Morse är enastående i ledarrollerna. Ett becksvart lågmält relationsdrama som dock sjuder av humanitet och framförallt berättarglädje.
Fotot är hisnande vackert med blekta färgtoner och bildspråket oerhört poetiskt och stillsamt.
Musiken som till största delen består av en melankolisk akustisk gitarr gör också sitt till. Men filmens höjdpunkt är nog ändå när kameran skildrar alla huvudpersonerna till tonerna av Jefferson Airplanes "Coming back to me". Ett mkt starkt ögonblick. En av 90-talets bästa filmer, alla kategorier. En film man ALDRIG glömmer, den sitter i långt efter första upplevelsen. Filmen är också en hyllning till Penns förebilder Hal Ashby och John Cassavetes. 2 av den amerikanska subjektivismens gudfäder och Penn har verkligen träffat rätt i stämning och karaktärsteckning med "Indian Runner".
En given favorit i DVD-samlingen. -
MCT:April 7, 2007
I found this quite dull and slow, however Penn creates quiet a horrific tale out of minor (and common) familial and domestic situations, i quite liked that as it relates more to the average person - more realistic etc etc. Overall, its an okay film but nothing i'd have the time or enthusiasm to watch again. But if you want to see Viggo Mortensen starkers, then this is the film for you haha
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MCT:March 24, 2007
This is the movie for which Viggo deserved an Oscar! A raw and powerful performance which sticks with you for a long time.. This is certainly one of Viggo's best movies...
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MCT:February 20, 2007I love viggo sooo much but it wasn't such a great movie, very depressing only i do have to say that viggo acted really well, he played a bad guy but he played him well, but then you see him in other roles and he is such a lovable character and that really shows how talented he really is!!!!!!!
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MCT:January 7, 2007
Depressing, ponderous, in places even pretentious. But full-frontal Viggo nudity makes it ALL better.
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MCT:December 24, 2006
Not the greatest movie, but certainly worth watching for the incredible performances of Viggo Mortensen and David Morse.
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MCT:June 28, 2006
non mi sono mai piaciuti i film che finiscono bene dopo situazioni apparentemente irrecuperabili. The indian runner non è certamente tra questi. E' il primo film da regista di sean penn, che si è ispirato a 1 canzone di bruce springsteen ( highway patrolman)
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MCT:April 30, 2006
Mortensen's great in this movie. It's really touching and make you think about your own selfishness. It's a rather depress proof movie. When I see it, I cry a lot and then I forget all about being depressed.
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MCT:March 16, 2006
Better editing and finer direction could have made this a classic. Good performances are, however, emphasized by Penn's unique film style.
