Deliverance (1972)
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Review #1,074 |
THE SCOOP
Director: John Boorman
Cast: Jon Voight, Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty, Ronny Cox
Plot: Intent on seeing the Cahulawassee River before it's turned into one huge lake, outdoor fanatic Lewis Medlock takes his friends on a river-rafting trip they'll never forget into the dangerous American back-country.
Genre: Adventure / Drama / Thriller
Awards: Nom. for 3 Oscars - Best Picture, Best Director, Best Film Editing
Runtime: 110min
Rating: M18 for mature themes and violence.
IN RETROSPECT (Spoilers: NO)
“Don't ever do nothin' like this
again. Don't come back up here.”
When
I was about twelve, I saw a movie called The
River Wild (1994) on HBO. I
remembered it starred Kevin Bacon as an armed killer and Meryl Streep as a rafting
expert of incredible courage. With most of the film set on a fast-flowing
river, it was a suspenseful ride through the rapids, even if in retrospect the merits
of the film weren’t
particularly stellar.
Tracing
back to two decades earlier, we recall a similar river-rafting film titled Deliverance, perhaps for the wrong
reason. Often a staple in lists of
controversial films, John Boorman's work is best known, albeit infamously, for
its male rape scene in which the victim was asked to squeal like a pig.
I
thought pigs oink, but anyway, Boorman's muscular film till this day continues
to provoke with its depiction of violence and psychological trauma, all this to
the white-knuckle tune of an adventure film not for kids.
Deliverance stars
Jon Voight, Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty and Ronny Cox as the quartet going on a
river-rafting trip down the Cahulawassee River before it turns into a huge lake
to facilitate urban development. It is a
trip that will haunt them for the rest of their lives.
Shot
by the legendary Vilmos Zsigmond (Close Encounters of the Third Kind, 1977; The Deer Hunter, 1978), Deliverance puts
us right into the thick of action as the actors brave the dangerous rapids, and
in one nail-biting sequence, Voight climbs a steep cliff (for real) to counter
an armed hillbilly.
The
supreme camerawork, so steady and assured despite the bobbling river, draws us
into Man’s
physical encounter with nature, and in turn gives us an immediacy that
illuminates the film’s
key theme –
the force of nature v. the fury of Man.
But the question is: who is more cruel?
As
derogatory as the term ‘hillbilly’
may imply, Deliverance reinforces the
troubling notion that is the poor, uncivilized and violent White…
who is capable of manslaughter and rape.
From the perspective of the hillbilly, these rafters are trespassing
nature, are the very representation of the urban dweller seeking refuge in the
wilderness, and if nothing else, they do not belong, neither should they
exist.
Boorman
sets all these themes up, drawing a parallel with Man’s
reformation of nature in the name of development. In other words, the mutual raping between man
and nature, quite simply the essence of James Dickey’s
screenplay based on his novel of the same name, is both a cause and
consequence.
Deliverance is
far from a masterpiece, but it is as bold a work as any from the early 1970s
New Hollywood period, no less from someone who has won Best Director twice at
Cannes.
Verdict: Muscular, bold, and suspenseful, this ride
through the rapids mostly thrills.
GRADE: B+
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