Michelle Williams (Actor), Bruce Greenwood (Actor), Kelly Reichardt (Director) | Format: DVD
2,752% Sales Rank in Movies & TV: 389 (was 11,098 yesterday) Release Date: September 13, 2011
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Review & Description
MEEK'S CUTOFF, from acclaimed director Kelly Reichardt (WENDY AND LUCY, OLD JOY), is a stark and poetic drama set in 1845, the earliest days of the treacherous Oregon Trail. A wagon train of three families (including two-time Academy Award® nominee Michelle Williams) has hired mountain man Stephen Meek to guide them over the Cascade Mountains. Claiming to know a shortcut, Meek leads the group on an unmarked path across the high plain desert, only to become lost in the dry rock and sage. Over the coming days, the emigrants must face the scourges of hunger, thirst, and their own lack of faith in each others' instincts for survival. When a Native American wanderer crosses their path, the emigrants are torn between their trust in a guide who has proven himself unreliable and a man who has always been seen as their natural born enemy.Kelly Reichardt's fourth feature, and the third to take place in the Pacific Northwest, arrives in the guise of a Western. On the Oregon Trail in 1845, three couples travel in covered wagons with slippery guide Stephen Meek (an unrecognizable Bruce Greenwood), but days pass, and water remains elusive. Emily (Michelle Williams, who anchored Reichardt's Wendy and Lucy) laments that "he's gotten in over his head." Meek insists that relief lies around the next ridge, but that's never the case, until an alkaline lake appears. Unfortunately, it's unsuitable for drinking, so they push on. About Meek, Emily's husband (Will Patton) wonders, "Is he ignorant or is he just plain evil?" (The fine cast also includes Zoe Kazan, Paul Dano, Shirley Henderson, Neal Huff, and Tommy Nelson.) The group's bond frays further when a Cayuse Indian (Ron Rondeaux) locks them in his sights. Meek attempts to squeeze information out of him, but he doesn't understand English. On the assumption that he's equally lost and scared, Emily tries to gain his trust by sharing food and mending a moccasin, but he keeps his distance, leading to a showdown with an unexpected result (and one of Williams's finer performances). Always attuned to the rhythms of nature, Reichardt has produced a meditative take on the genre that feels more enigmatic than most--with the possible exception of Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man--even if the period details always look right. With her focus on faded calico dresses and vast aquamarine skies, Meek's Cutoff offers a beautiful vision of harsh times. --Kathleen C. Fennessy Read more
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