Susan Granger’s review of “Seraphim Falls” (Samuel Goldwyn Films)
Set in 1868, five years after the end of the American Civil War, this epic Western thriller revolves around relentless revenge.
As the story opens, a mysterious, bearded stranger (Pierce Brosnan) is ambushed and shot in the Ruby mountain wilderness of Nevada by a former Colonel in the Confederate Army (Liam Neeson) and his hired posse of trackers. Terrified, he flees, tumbling down a snowy slope, falling into a rushing river and surviving a steep waterfall. Thoroughly chilled and bleeding profusely, he drags himself to shore, digs out the bullet embedded in his arm with his hunting knife and cauterizes the wound, while stifling his pain. Then he continues running – with the Colonel and his men close behind.
Once in the lowlands, the chase continues, as the stranger steals a horse from some bank robbers, then tries to steal another horse from a pioneer family as his pursuers encounter a wagon train of Mormon settlers. There’s a hide-and-seek interlude in a rowdy construction camp for the transcontinental railroad and a surreal encounter with a “cure-all” potion peddler (Anjelica Huston). Gradually, we discover that the taciturn stranger is actually a former Union Army captain whose troops senselessly slaughtered his pursuer’s wife and children.
The violence-drenched, biblically-themed, allegorical screenplay was written and directed by TV helmer David Von Ancken – with writing assistance by Abby Everett Jaques – and produced by Mel Gibson’s Icon Productions. If the ambiguous story seems familiar, that’s because it unabashedly resembles Clint Eastwood’s “The Outlaw Josey Wales.” What’s most memorable – and commendable – is the spectacular cinematography by John Toll (“Braveheart,” Legends of the Fall”). On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Seraphim Falls” is a sanctimonious, slow-paced 5. It’s 111 ponderous minutes of retribution and, eventually, forgiveness.
