The River Wild (DVD)

...plot spoilers even worse than the ones the scriptwriters put in!!


************************************************


Is it a beached whale? Is it a swaddled Inuit Eskimo? No, it’s ShoppingGirl, wrapped in cosy pyjamas and staying up long past her bedtime to watch the end of a cheesy thriller the very premise of which would have most sensible folks guffawing into their TV guides.

Meryl Streep ...
...features white water, goodies, baddies, the great outdoors and a crazy man who wants to knife everybody, you just can’t help yourself from doing a mental ‘plinky plink’ of duelling banjos, as shades of Deliverance come to mind. But this film is about as much like Deliverance as Jack Nicholson is like Brian from Big Brother. But is that such a bad thing?

It’s all very wholesome. Streep plays Gail, mother to the ten-year old Roarke, ... more

WARNING: This op contains plot spoilers even worse than the ones the scriptwriters put in!!

************************************************

Is it a beached whale? Is it a swaddled Inuit Eskimo? No, it’s ShoppingGirl, wrapped in cosy pyjamas and staying up long past her bedtime to watch the end of a cheesy thriller the very premise of which would have most sensible folks guffawing into their TV guides.

Meryl Streep as action heroine? Sounds like a sketch from French and Saunders, but I assure you it’s real. Here she plays Gail, a teacher from Boston who also happens to be a fully trained and experienced river guide. There ain’t no rapid she can’t tame, no canoe she can’t skilfully flip. And no wetsuit she can’t fill out admirably – tantalising zips and all.

And when a movie features white water, goodies, baddies, the great outdoors and a crazy man who wants to knife everybody, you just can’t help yourself from doing a mental ‘plinky plink’ of duelling banjos, as shades of Deliverance come to mind. But this film is about as much like Deliverance as Jack Nicholson is like Brian from Big Brother. But is that such a bad thing?

It’s all very wholesome. Streep plays Gail, mother to the ten-year old Roarke, whose name rhymes with ‘book’. Roarke is played by the kid from Jurassic Park, and just like in that film he’s required here to be at death’s door one minute and then punching the air shouting ‘way to go!’ once the immediate terror has retreated – as you do when having nearly been slashed to death by a veloceraptor.

Dad is a good guy at heart but far too wrapped up in his work. He’s an architect (read ‘smug yuppie who must be taught true American family values’), and doesn’t fancy a week of white water rafting thank you very much – but has a last minute wobble and decides that in order to save his fragile marriage and shaky father-son bond he really better strap on that ill-fitting wetsuit and at least pretend to be enjoying himself. After all, his earth-mother missus can easily do the whooping and hollering required to power a small African nation so he can take a back seat, right?

But does Gail want him to take a seat at all? Before the trip has even begun she’s been befriended by the sweet, charming, handsome all round good-guy that is Wade, played by the ever-charismatic Kevin Bacon. Clearly this signals ‘FROTHING PSYCHOPATH’ to the rest of us, but Bacon does a good job of hiding his inner snarl and soon Wade is making ‘hey buddy!’ inroads with the little fella too. Dad’s feeling squeezed out of the picture but it’s only a family rafting trip – what could possibly go wrong?

So off they go – the family in one boat and Wade and his openly menacing friend in another. So far, so idyllic. Watch and gasp as Streep proves herself to be a very proficient oarswoman. Swoon as mountains, forests and blue skies rush by in a blur as we negotiate the rapids. Smile ruefully as Dad tries but fails to impress his son with his sadly lacking survival skills.

Pretty soon the lads in the other boat are impressed too, and ask Gail to help them get down the river safely – tragically, they’ve lost their navigator. This coincides with a radio news bulletin about an armed robbery having taken place nearby. Neon signs are flashing but there’s none so blind as those in cheesy thrillers so Gail agrees to get them as far as Bridal Falls – but tells them that once they hit the killer stretch known as The Gauntlet, they’re on their own! Gail has done the Gauntlet once in her life as a crazy teen, but it’s so dangerous it’s now been made illegal to raft down it. With a hubby and kid to think of, she’s no longer the adrenalin junkie she once was.

Yes, the partnership soon goes very pearshaped and before you can say ‘Meryl Streep skinnydipping – at her age?’ – the family have been taken hostage and told they’re paddling for their lives. Only with Streep’s help can the baddies make their escape downriver. Hubby is disposable and is told as much, but the boy is a bargaining tool and must be kept alive.

The action that follows is laughable, yet compulsive. As tensions rise, the stakes get higher - and just as we think that Wade’s obvious admiration for Gail is going to save her bacon (way hay!), he goes and does something unspeakable like shooting an amiable, smiling river ranger and laughing as he drowns. This is a VERY BAD GUY we’re dealing with.

The story developments have been clearly signalled in advance (the family can do sign language, the boy has a Swiss army knife hidden in his boot, they all know how to do smoke signals) so in some ways it’s just a case of waiting for all these elements to come together.

But Dad gets bumped off!! Streep and Dino-boy are inconsolable (yet still able to do the ‘way to go!’ thing the next day – it’s almost as if they know he isn’t really dead!).

Streep makes a few heroic attempts to biff the bad guys with her oars, but even the fat sidekick who can’t swim appears to be made of Teflon. There’s nothing for it but to take their captors all the way down The Gauntlet!

It’s a rollicking, rushing ride and even the newly widowed Gail can manage to whoop with joy as they manage to get through the rocky rapids alive. But Dad isn’t about to let his family go just like that. With newly aquired outdoorsman skills, he’s ready to save the day. Using a dog, a barrel and an Indian rockpainting talent he never knew he had, he’s about to prove that he truly deserves his son’s respect.

The ending is pretty shocking, and one person gets killed. The money floats off downstream, and we’ve all learned that even when guns and baddies are ruling the roost – there’s nothing quite so strong as a loving family. The final line of the film will be a godsend to aspiring supermodels the nation over – instant vomiting is guaranteed, or your money back.

It’s as cheesy as all-get-out, but I sat up and watched this frothy little number right to the end. Predictable and soapy it may be, but Streep’s performance does genuinely lift the film out of the realms of the naff. Yes, there are plot holes you could shoot peas through, but Bacon as a baddie is pretty compulsive (and not entirely unsexy, girls). It’s hard to really gasp in true terror as the majority of the action takes place outdoors in sunny daylight, but the rafting scenes are exhilarating, and the pace quick enough to maintain our interest to the end.

It’s not high art folks but as an action heroine Meryl Streep does exactly what she says on the tin. Roll on the sequel: Macrame Girls Kick Ass!

 

...less