I have mostly respect for Vigo Mortensen ever since I first saw him, like most people, as Aragorn in Lord of the Rings. Since that time I tended to follow what he did and except for that one time that he strangely got involved in a Presidential primary endorsing an odd and very fringe candidate, I respected him. He has a number of quite good films under his belt aside from playing the titular role in LotR and he tends to do a very good job, especially in dark and serious roles. In "The Dead Don't Hurt" he explores the western genre in a rather morose yet satisfying manner, and for the most part he absolutely nails it especially when you consider that he handled nearly every aspect of this very difficult to pull off in modern times genre.
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This movie takes back to the 1800's in California, where life is tough and basic and it is very much a man's world. This is where we meet Vivienne, a woman of French background that doesn't want to fit into the category of doting wife, and has an independent spirit that takes her away from a life of luxury while being courted by a wealthy aristocrat of sorts and instead, decides to sneak away with a rather poor but charming Danish immigrant to live a life in peace in the countryside. Their relationship doesn't seem terribly romantic most of the time, because she is content to be in charge of her own affairs and Olsen (Holger Olsen, played by Mortenson) is content to have her be that way as well, only once even mentioning marriage, which she denies him even though they clearly have deep affections for one another.
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In a way this movie is kind of a rewrite of what actual history would have been like, because a life like this certainly would have been at the minimum, frowned upon, by the people that were alive at this point in time but unlike what Netflix or others would have attempted to do with a topic matter of this sort, Vigo and the other producers are not trying to convey any sort of social issue to anyone here: They are just presenting it as a situation that could have happened and likely did, albeit quite a rare one.
They live a life of peace away from the others when they move away from California and instead opt for a life in their small community in Nevada. This continues in relative bliss until one day Olsen decides to sign up to be a soldier with the Union during the civil war. This results in him leaving Vivienne alone on their farm for quite some time during which, well, less-than-awesome things end up happening to her in his absence.
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Upon his eventual return, he is stoic about everything but it is evident to him that things are awry when a child is on the porch with Vivienne at their farm that cannot possibly be his. He remains calm because before he left to join the war she was very clear with him about that she "will not wait for him." However, when it comes out why this child is here in the first place, the story changes to one of vengeance, although not in a all-encompassing way.
There is a lot of emotion in this movie and it is done in an atypical way as far as westerns are concerned and this is a refreshing take on how this sort of film is typically done, because you have to do a bit of thinking just to figure out what the hell is going on. I say this because the film is not portrayed in a linear fashion. For example, in the first 1 minute of the movie we are shown Vivienne's dead body on a bed as Olsen, who we do not yet see in the face, closing her eyes as she lays dead in a bed. Then we end up getting thrust around the timeline many many times during the film to various points that are important to the story.
I mostly enjoyed this approach: I like it because it is something different and therefore sets itself apart from every other film by using this sort of "Pulp Fiction" approach to storytelling, I got a bit annoyed at it though, because at times it is quite difficult to determine where we are in space and time. I suppose I enjoy the approach more than dislike it because well, had they told the story in a "beginning to end" sort of way, it would have ended up being just another western that basically has a similar concept to everything else out there.
Therefore, I will applaud Vigo for having done things this way. It is a huge risk to do something like this and every now and then it pays off. I believe that in this movie, that it paid off. We stay invested in the various characters even though we have to think quite a lot while it is going on to piece together the parts of the story and realize what order they are supposed to go in.
This is a tale of love, revenge, of conquest and coming of age, all at once and if you have the time to really focus on what is going on, I think that most film fans will find this as unusually wonderful as I did. This isn't the most exciting film that you are ever going to see and I think this is reflected in the less than $2 million it made at the box office. Hell, it premiered last year and I didn't even know that it happened. So it isn't a blockbuster by any means and perhaps it was never meant to be.
Should I watch it?
The answer to this kind of lies in you, just like it is for most people. If you require non-stop action and loads of supernatural sorts of things happening in some film the like of which Jason Statham would star in, then no, you will not enjoy this. However, if you are the type of person that watches a lot of movies like I do and appreciates when people do something very different, and even moreso when basically one man does all of the work, then this will be something that is really special to you. Vigo did so much in the creation of this movie including composing the score which is really good also. For me, there is a time and a place for a film of this magnitude, and I think that if you are going to attempt to enjoy this one, you need to be able to devote time to it, and not just have it on in the background while you are doing something else as your primary focus. If you take the latter approach, you definitely aren't going to know what the hell is going on since the story doesn't follow a linear pattern at all.
I enjoyed it, but would completely understand why others wouldn't like it. Oh! It would probably be helpful if you appreciate western films as well. I like them because of the difficulties that filmmakers face when attempting to recreate an environment that hasn't existed for well over 100 years. It doesn't look like any of this was green-screened, so the scouting alone would have been a majestically huge project all by itself.
Currently this film doesn't stream as part of a package on any platform, but can be legally purchased on Amazon and the MS store, among others