River Queen

I got lumbered with this title. This site, like many other review sites and even traditional publications, get regularly sent a fair amount of unsolicited material, and who gets the titles is often on a pot luck basis.

Now, I take a certain professional pride in writing reviews for this site. I try to research titles so that I can tell readers more than "x meets y, y tells x to use a better mouthwash, x wallops y." I like to impart something about the story behind the title as well as my own personal feelings about it.

I struggle when it comes to playing silly games with PR companies and studios. I humour them when they send out a DVD-R with just an example of the content on it. I humour them when a high-profile title includes "property of Tantamount Pictures Home Entertainment" superimposed over the action. I even humour them when a disc has to be mailed back within a couple of days for security reasons. But my patience kind of wears thin when I get a test disc for a pretty obscure title about a fortnight after it has gone on release, and the PR company sends an SAE to return it as the Studio wants to keep track of all of its freebie test discs.

All in all, the above is something of a shame, as River Queen is the sort of movie I normally have a field day writing about. From the outset, the picture was troubled - seven years after director Vincent Ward's last picture, five years in development, three years from theatrical release to this DVD. During production, lead actress Samantha Morton fell ill and toward the end of the shoot, Director Ward was taken off the production at the insistence of the insurers. He returned to the production on completion of principal photography, which had been continued by the film's cinematographer Alun Bollinger.

Set in 1868 New Zealand, a young Irishwoman Sarah O'Brien (Samantha Morton), brings her family into disrepute when she falls pregnant to a handsome Maori man, who tragically passes away from illness before the baby is born. Abandoned by her father, a soldier in the British colonial army, Sarah finds herself all alone to face impending motherhood and life as an outcast in a community wrought by conflict between the indigenous Maori people and the marauding colonists.
Seven years on, Sarah's young son, Boy, is suddenly kidnapped by his Maori grandfather who is eager for him to return to his native roots. Devastated, Sarah's life becomes a search for her son with the help of her only friend, a disillusioned, broken-down soldier, Doyle (Kiefer Sutherland).

If movies like Last of the Mohicans or The Mission ring your bell, you might get something out of this movie. It's very obviously a very personal movie for director Vincent Ward, and while the performances of the actors are a little uneven, the story is worth the telling.

Video
As with any movie shot in New Zealand post-LOTR, the scenery is the star. Alun Bollinger's photography carries the movie, which is presented in its original 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen.

Extras
Trailer and subtitles