Despite our modern violent and visceral cinema, this film stands the test of time as a harrowing and compelling film of four men taken out of their world and plunged into another one, where beauty and excitement are blotted out by death and destruction. Yet it is more than simply that. The men of the mountains do prey on the men of the city but in the end are destroyed themselves. The flooding that will come anyway will obliterate everything, the dead bodies, the scene of the crime, the wilderness itself. There is a strange melancholic and apocalyptic feel to the film.
It is filmed brilliantly. There is nothing unreal about the canoeing scenes. The actors are there fighting the currents and the rocks. You can feel their exhilaration as they paddle along. Then it all comes unstuck and each man reacts accordingly. The four male leads, John Voight. Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty and Ronny Cox, are all solid and believable, possibly Reynold's finest screen performance.
The music is sparse and based on the 'Duelin' Banjos' theme that is as memorable as the zither tune from 'The Third Man'. The scene where it is introduced is rightly hailed as a classic. There is so much going on in that scene on so many layers.
John Boorman is a director with a raft of interesting films to his name and this is one of his best.
It is filmed brilliantly. There is nothing unreal about the canoeing scenes. The actors are there fighting the currents and the rocks. You can feel their exhilaration as they paddle along. Then it all comes unstuck and each man reacts accordingly. The four male leads, John Voight. Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty and Ronny Cox, are all solid and believable, possibly Reynold's finest screen performance.
The music is sparse and based on the 'Duelin' Banjos' theme that is as memorable as the zither tune from 'The Third Man'. The scene where it is introduced is rightly hailed as a classic. There is so much going on in that scene on so many layers.
John Boorman is a director with a raft of interesting films to his name and this is one of his best.