Down In The Valley

Saturday was small little indie movie day with Down In The Valley. Don't worry if you haven't heard of it you're probably in the majority not the minority on this one.

It's an interesting little character study drama starring Evan Rachel Wood and Edward Norton. It's a good story and moviee. Excellently acted by not just Evan and Edward but also Rory Culkin and David Morse. The movie has a bit in common with Taxi Driver only in this one the characters that are the equivilant of Jodie Foster and Robert De Niro are in a relationship.

There was one really odd part to the story that ended up making no since and kind of hurting the film. Lonnie (Rory) tells Harlan (Edward) that Wade (David) isn't really his and Tobe's (Evan) father. You keep thinking for the rest of the film that, that will some how come into play but it never does. It's never brought up again and there's never an explanation of why he has custody of them or if he's any relation to them at all. They should have just cut that bit of dialogue out of the film.



Spoiler Alert:


The movie builds to a twist that I totally never saw coming and shocked me. As the relationship grows between Tobe (Evan) and Harlan (Edward) he becomes more and more obsessive toward her. But, not just towards her also towards her brother Lonnie (Rory). He gets off on the wrong foot with their dad Wade (David) and things just slide down hill from there.

It's clear early on that Harlan is a little off and that is made apparent when he steals a horse. He does return it but the cops get involved and Wade has to come get him and Tobe and it is through this that Harlan sees the violent side of Wade. It is at that point that he seems to decide that he needs to get them away from Wade.

It comes to Harlan's attention that Wade really isn't around much and Lonnie is alone a lot. After being told by Wade to stay away from Tobe he still comes around. When she doesn't come see him one day he goes to her place and finds Lonnie alone. It's at this time that he decides to take Lonnie out and teach him how to shoot. The way the story is building at this point you are certain that Lonnie or Harlan is going to end up shooting Wade. Of course Wade is home when they get home and he puts a gun to Harlan's head. It's after this incident that Tobe tells Harlan to stay away for awhile.

Well he doesn't like that and robs a house to get the money to take her and Lonnie away. Only when he comes to get her, she doesn't want to go with him. During their argument he shoots Tobe. Holy crap gut punch, totally stopped breathing for a moment. He takes off when Wade comes home. Luckily Wade finds her and gets her to the hospital.

After having shot himself in the leg Harlan returns to the house and tells Lonnie how Wade shot him and Tobe and Lonnie takes off with Harlan. At this point Lonnie becomes the stupid child alive. He spends the night in a barely standing old cabin with him and when Wade, the old guy that Harlan again stole a horse from, and another guy come looking for them in the night he again takes off with Harlan. They spend the night in what seems to be a ghost town. And in the morning it turns out it's either a movie set or a ghost town being used as a movie set. This is the one really stupid scene in the movie when Harlan wakes up and actually seems to believe that they have returned to the old west. This part is also really stupid when Harlan ends up in the shot yet no one yells cut even though he's in the totally wrong clothes for the era.

Wade and a cop show up and Lonnie being stupid alerts Harlan to this fact and ends up getting the cop killed. He ends up taking off with Harlan again. Wade manages to track them down and killing Harlan.

Luckily in the end Tobe survives.



I paid full price for this movie and it was well worth it for every aspect of the film.