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Ravenous (1999)
Directed by Antonia Bird
Stars: Guy Pearce, Robert Carlyle, Jeffrey Jones, David Arquette
Ravenous sucked me in right from the get-go. The movie spends about 15 minutes on exposition and character introduction, and then gets right to the…if you’ll excuse the expression…meat of the film. The movie takes place during the Spanish-American War, and concerns a Captain John Boyd (Guy Pearce), who is assigned to Fort Spencer, an isolated outpost in the western Sierra Nevada Mountains. He arrives in the dead of winter to find that he one in a company of only eight people inhabiting the fort (it’s the off season, apparently).
Soon after Boyd’s arrival, another visitor arrives at Fort Spencer: a Mr. F.W. Calhoun (Robert Carlyle). He is the last survivor of a party of pioneers who got lost in the mountains, and were forced to take shelter in a cave from a winter storm; a storm that left them snowed in and unable to continue on. He tells a horrific tale that sounds like it was lifted straight from the Donner party: first they ate the oxen, then the horses, then their belts and shoes, and then…. well…one of the party died and… Fearing for his life, Calhoun fled when there were only three of the party left, and made his way to Fort Spencer.
The commander of the Fort, Colonel Hart (Jeffrey Jones) mounts a search party, Boyd among them, to try and rescue the remaining members of Calhoun’s expedition. They eventually find the cave, and Boyd and Private Reich (Neal McDonough) go inside to investigate. Once inside, they find what is left of the pioneer band. And then the real horror begins.
There is so much good stuff in this movie that I hardly know where to begin. The director, Antonia Bird, has a way of making the audience (well, me at least) feel the isolation of these men, and how out of touch they are with the rest of the world; of how truly alone they are. The characters are all well drawn, and one can find sympathy for even the worst of them. The performances are all good, although it seemed like David Arquette’s character didn’t have much to do; just giggle and act stoned most of the time (not much of a stretch). But all in all they seemed like real people to me; people who were in this fix, not just characters spouting lines in a play.
The music was kind of hit and miss. Sometimes the twanging folksy sound seemed out of place with what was happening on the screen, but at other times it hit just the right note, sending shivers down my spine.
This is not a movie for the squeamish. It is a story of cannibalism, of superstition and mystical power. It invokes the spirit of vampires drinking the blood of men and werewolves tearing at human flesh, and the ancient Indian legend of the wendigo
Ravenous is a reminder that not all monsters have fangs or masks or razor-tipped fingers. There are monsters who are handsome, cultured and well spoken, and that’s what makes them all the more horrifying.
Ravenous (1999)
Directed by Antonia Bird
Stars: Guy Pearce, Robert Carlyle, Jeffrey Jones, David Arquette
Ravenous sucked me in right from the get-go. The movie spends about 15 minutes on exposition and character introduction, and then gets right to the…if you’ll excuse the expression…meat of the film. The movie takes place during the Spanish-American War, and concerns a Captain John Boyd (Guy Pearce), who is assigned to Fort Spencer, an isolated outpost in the western Sierra Nevada Mountains. He arrives in the dead of winter to find that he one in a company of only eight people inhabiting the fort (it’s the off season, apparently).
Soon after Boyd’s arrival, another visitor arrives at Fort Spencer: a Mr. F.W. Calhoun (Robert Carlyle). He is the last survivor of a party of pioneers who got lost in the mountains, and were forced to take shelter in a cave from a winter storm; a storm that left them snowed in and unable to continue on. He tells a horrific tale that sounds like it was lifted straight from the Donner party: first they ate the oxen, then the horses, then their belts and shoes, and then…. well…one of the party died and… Fearing for his life, Calhoun fled when there were only three of the party left, and made his way to Fort Spencer.
The commander of the Fort, Colonel Hart (Jeffrey Jones) mounts a search party, Boyd among them, to try and rescue the remaining members of Calhoun’s expedition. They eventually find the cave, and Boyd and Private Reich (Neal McDonough) go inside to investigate. Once inside, they find what is left of the pioneer band. And then the real horror begins.
There is so much good stuff in this movie that I hardly know where to begin. The director, Antonia Bird, has a way of making the audience (well, me at least) feel the isolation of these men, and how out of touch they are with the rest of the world; of how truly alone they are. The characters are all well drawn, and one can find sympathy for even the worst of them. The performances are all good, although it seemed like David Arquette’s character didn’t have much to do; just giggle and act stoned most of the time (not much of a stretch). But all in all they seemed like real people to me; people who were in this fix, not just characters spouting lines in a play.
The music was kind of hit and miss. Sometimes the twanging folksy sound seemed out of place with what was happening on the screen, but at other times it hit just the right note, sending shivers down my spine.
This is not a movie for the squeamish. It is a story of cannibalism, of superstition and mystical power. It invokes the spirit of vampires drinking the blood of men and werewolves tearing at human flesh, and the ancient Indian legend of the wendigo
Ravenous is a reminder that not all monsters have fangs or masks or razor-tipped fingers. There are monsters who are handsome, cultured and well spoken, and that’s what makes them all the more horrifying.