“Deadfall” (also called “Kin”) has a line “You can choose
your girl friend, but you can’t choose your family.” Magnolia Pictures and “2929” have produced a
taut thriller, spectacular to watch in the northern woods (it’s supposed to
take place on the Michigan U.P. but it was filmed in Quebec, like a good old
DGC film) without quite all the ironic black comedy of a Coen Brother’s film
(yes, the north country sometimes isn’t for “old men” either.) It seems that a Sandy-like superstorm has
struck Michigan before Thanksgiving, leading to constant whiteouts for the
first half of the film.
The movie starts with a spectacular auto wreck in the woods,
and a brother Addison (Eric Bana) and
sister (Olivia Wilde) on the lam after an Indian casino heist gone wrong. With Addison on the run, it’s not safe to
live anywhere in the surrounding woods.
The film has two brutal rural home invasions, and another subplot involving an ex-con
boxer Jay (Charlie Hunnam), who falls in with the sister as the film heads
toward a climax on Thanksgiving Daywith Jay’s parents (Sissy Spacek and Kris
Kristofferson). There’s also an aspiring
deputy sheriff Hannah (Kate Mara), whose
dad (“The Sheriff”, Treat Williams, from “Everwood”) tries to keep her down, as
she aspires to go to the FBI Academy. There is something terrifying about Addison's attitude: he is out to prove you a coward if you can't stand up him and protect "family" from his shotgun barrel.
I saw the film at Landmark E-Street in Washington DC, light
crowd, great presentation on a wide screen.
This movie keeps you on edge, and makes you (or me, at least) root for
characters you wouldn’t think you could “like”. Yet, after a number of Coen films to compare
it to, it comes across as a “good B movie”, definitely genre-driven.
The film is directed by Stefan Ruzowitzky and written by
Zach Dean. The official site is here.
There’s an earlier Coppola film by the same name (1993),
unrelated story, owned by Lionsgate.
I’ll mention a 1976 film with Kristofferson, “The Sailor Who
Fell from Grace with the Sea” (Embassy),
a strange film that I saw on the Upper East Side with a friend in my NYC days.
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