Meek's Cutoff (film)
Meek's Cutoff is a 2010 American Western film directed by Kelly Reichardt. The film was shown in competition at the 67th Venice International Film Festival.[2] The story is loosely based on a historical incident on the Oregon Trail in 1845, in which frontier guide Stephen Meek led a wagon train on an ill-fated journey through the Oregon desert along the route later known as the Meek Cutoff in the western United States.
| Meek's Cutoff | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Kelly Reichardt |
| Produced by | Elizabeth Cuthrell Neil Kopp Anish Savjani David Urrutia |
| Written by | Jonathan Raymond |
| Starring | Michelle Williams Paul Dano Bruce Greenwood Shirley Henderson Neal Huff Zoe Kazan Tommy Nelson Will Patton Rod Rondeaux |
| Music by | Jeff Grace |
| Cinematography | Chris Blauvelt |
| Edited by | Kelly Reichardt |
Production company | Evenstar Films Film Science Harmony Productions Primitive Nerd |
| Distributed by | Oscilloscope Laboratories |
Release date |
|
Running time | 104 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $2 million |
| Box office | $1.2 million[1] |
Plot
A small group of settlers travelling across the Oregon High Desert in 1845 suspect that their guide, Stephen Meek, may not know the area well enough to plot a safe and certain route. A journey that was supposed to take two weeks, via what became known as the Meek Cutoff, stretches into five. With no clear sense of where they are going, tensions rise as water and food run low. The wives look on, unable to participate in the decision making, as their husbands discuss how long they should continue to follow Meek.
The dynamics of power shift when they capture a lone native and hold him in the hope he will lead them to a source of water, despite Meek's wish to kill him at once. Meek argues that the native cannot be trusted, but the group by now have no greater confidence in Meek. Later, when Meek prepares to shoot the native, Mrs. Tetherow intervenes. In the end, after the group encounter the positive sign of a tree, Meek submits to majority opinion and the group continue to follow the native.
Cast
- Michelle Williams as Emily Tetherow
- Bruce Greenwood as Stephen Meek
- Shirley Henderson as Glory White
- Tommy Nelson as Jimmy White
- Neal Huff as William White
- Paul Dano as Thomas Gately
- Zoe Kazan as Millie Gately
- Will Patton as Solomon Tetherow
- Rod Rondeaux as The Indian
Critical reception
Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 86% based on reviews from 127 critics and reports a rating average of 7.54 out of 10, a generally positive reception. It reported the consensus, "Moving at a contemplative speed unseen in most westerns, Meek's Cutoff is an effective, intense journey of terror and survival in the untamed frontier."[3] At Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film received an average score of 85 based on 36 reviews.[4]
See also
- Survival film, about the film genre, with a list of related films
References
- "Meek's Cutoff (2011) - Box Office Mojo". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2016-11-20.
- "Venezia 67". labiennale.org. 2010-07-29. Retrieved 2010-07-29.
- "Meek's Cutoff". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved July 5, 2011.
- "Meek's Cutoff". Metacritic. Retrieved July 5, 2011.