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A River Runs Through It

A River Runs Through It

List Price: $14.94
Your Price: $11.21
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: it's a great movie about two brothers .
Review: I suggest everyone to see this movie because its a great movie about two brothers. I personaly learned alot from this movie and its a good movie for every age.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: it's a great movie about two brothers .
Review: oh i love rivers run throught because i learned a lot from it shows how this two brothers are different one is careful and one is wild me personaly love it and i love brad pitt its a really good movie for anyage its a good example for everyone!!!!!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: this movie is not a movie but a masterpiece!
Review: when you watch this movie, you can find many things about family and about human life ! I recommend you this movie strongly !!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Transendentalism (sp.?)
Review: Way back in English Lit, University of Oregon, 25 years ago, I remember one idea that that once something achieves perfection in anything, it self distructs, always. A near perfect chair exists, a near perfect painting, a near perfect poem, a near pefect fly fisherman. But none of these exist in a perfect form. There is only one perfection and to attempt to mimimic it assures distruction.

This movie portrays that notion, just fine.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: a cinematic sucess
Review: A River Runs Through It fits into the elite category of movies that can be enjoyed by audiences ranging from pubescent boys and girls to nursing home residents.
The movie owes much of its success to two eye-catching elements: the cinematography and Brad Pitt.
Set on the banks of Montana's Blackfoot River around World War I, A River Runs Through It tracks two brothers' coming of age. Norman the poet (Craig Sheffer) and Pauley the playboy (Pitt) grow from playful youngsters into scheming teenagers and then become individual adults with only one thing to keep them connected to each other: fly fishing. It is based on Norman Maclean's autobiographical novel of the same name and was released in late 1992.
Unlike many of other movies, A River Runs Through It exists with only an ounce of cheesy romance. Richard Friedenberg's writing revolves around a simple plot and sticks to it. The story focuses on the metamorphosing relationship of siblings from childhood to adulthood and the narration gives it a "The Wonder Years" sort of feel. Each character, no matter how minor, is well-developed. They lead happy-go-lucky lives where everything is fine and dandy, unless you break the golden rule. "In Montana there's three things we're never late for: church, work and fishing," says Paul.
As much a part of this story as the script and characters is the setting. Sunbeams streaming past lush clouds, through tall trees and falling onto crashing waters are the backdrop of the film. Philippe Rousselot, who won an Oscar for this film's cinematography, captures the simple beauty of nature in the arc of fish leaping over water and a fiery, red-orange sun washing over neverending plains of tall grain.
While most of the people in A River Runs Through It are customary and not very memorable, Pitt's Paul Maclean stands out as the beautiful sore thumb of Missoula, Montana. Aside from the repeated image of his sun-washed chest wading above the clear waters, he transforms to dancing a jig, brawling inside a speak-easy and drowning his worries away over shots of whiskey, to being a mama's boy for a brief second. This is the film that well-deservedly gave Pitt's acting credibility.
It is no coincidence that Pitt bears a striking resemblance to a young Robert Redford throughout the film. Redford, who directed and co-produced A River Runs Through It, cast himself as the ever-present narrator and, undoubtedly, wants his presence felt in every aspect of the film that is now a classic.
A River Runs Through It utilizes the best of each film element - from acting to writing to cinematography - to produce a piece enjoyable to a wide audience.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The ONLY Movie I Have Ever Cried To !
Review: A River Runs Through It is a stunning accomplishment for Robert Redford. The story is captivating, and yet one of the saddest movies I've ever seen.

This movie will produce feelings that will linger with you long after the ending credits !

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Stunning Scenery, Wonderful Story...and Brad Pitt too!
Review: This review refers to the Columbia/Tristar DVD edition of "A River Runs Through It"...

Even with Brad Pitt co-starring in this film, it was the awesome cinematography that kept me mesmerized. Filmed in the lush mountains and rivers of Montana, director Robert Redford and Director of Photography Phillipe Rousselot(who won an Oscar for his work on this film)capture the beauty of this land and the story.

Based on a autobiographical novella by Norman Maclean, we are swept back to the earlier part of the 20th century with the Maclean family. Family, church and Fly fishing came above all else. Norman, played at the younger age by newcomer Joseph Gordon-Levitt(who was honored with the Young Artists award in 1993 for his performance), and his younger brother Paul are close and come from a loving but highly disciplined household, run by their stern father(Tom Skerritt) the Reverend of the small town church. The Rev. is strict when it comes to their education, but a big part of that education is the freedom to fly-fish, enjoyed by all the Maclean men.

We watch as Norman and Paul grow into men(Craig Scheffer/Brad Pitt) and how differently their lives turn out. Norman grows into a fine scholar, but Paul takes a different path. His is one of a rebel, who finds trouble at every turn. But always they have their love for each other, their family, and their love of fly-fishing. Paul turns it into an art that is a sight to behold in that beautiful Montana scenery.

Other fine performances are turned in by Brenda Blethyn as Mrs. Maclean, Emily Lloyd as Jessie Burns, the girl Norman loses his heart to and Vann Gravage who plays the young Paul. A beautiful music score by Mark Isham adds greatly to the view without being obtrusive to the story. A fine screenplay by Richard Freidenberg will draw you in and keep you there. It's a great break from action movies without getting overly dramatic.

It is rated PG, but probably not appropiate for the younger viewers, there are some adult themes as well as brief nudity.

Columbia has done justice to this beautifully filmed movie in it's transfer to DVD. Just Gorgeous! Remastered in anamorphic widescreen(if you prefer full screen, that is on side B)with excellent clarity of the colors as well as the picture. The sound remastered in Dolby 2.0 Surround was very good, but I would have loved to hear it in 5.1. It may be viewed in French, Spanish(also stereo),or Portuguese(mono), and has subtitles in these languages as well as English. There are theatrical trailers and Talent files, but no other special features.

If your in the mood for a great action thriller, this is NOT it! This is a film to just sit back and savor.....Oh and I really did enjoy Brad Pitt's performance(almost as much as the scenery)...enjoy....Laurie

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Fitting adaptation
Review: When I first saw this film, shortly after it came out, I was disappointed that it did not stay closer to the book. Now, watching it again, I realise just how much the filmmakers have achieved in capturing the spirit of Norman Maclean's novella describing his life growing up in rural Montana in the early years of the twentieth century.

The casting is excellent, with a career-defining role for Brad Pitt. It's almost as if the director has taken the author's description of Paul, "he was beautiful" at face value. Playing opposite him, Craig Sheffer makes a suitably stiff-necked contribution as his elder sibling.

I also liked Emily Lloyd's performance as Norman's future wife Jesse. Strangely, she isn't refered to on the cover of the DVD, whereas Brenda Blethyn, who has less screen time, takes joint billing. I guess this just reflects the older actress's higher profile.

This film has so much to offer: flawless scenery and costumes, wonderful casting and fine acting. You also get the added bonus of Clint Eastwood's narrating. Yet I'm not sure that it will capture the imagination (or at times even make much sense) to people who haven't read the book. However, it's still one of the best adaptations I've ever seen.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: slow but beautiful
Review: River Runs Through It is a pretty film that pays tribute to the joys of fly fishing and the beauty of Montanna. It is has a plot that is one of the slowest to unwind that I've ever seen but it's based on a short autobiography and it had to be stretched and padded for the movie.

You have a soft hearted minister who has two sons. One is sensible and tells the story, the other one is "wild". Brad Pitt plays the wild brother, Norman. Norman is beautiful and charming and his family loves him and indulges him too much. He has a big time gambling problem and he hangs out with some bad people. You know how this is going to shake out. Norman might as well have Grim Reaper standing behind him in every scene and when he dies young and off screen you aren't surprised.

Other than that not much happens.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Spiritual Veneer, Clueless Content
Review: Since this movie seems to inspire nothing but praise in this forum, I thought I'd toss out an opinion against the current. I think people of faith ought to be warned against this movie. It is the kind of movie that religious people are naturally drawn to. It deals with the brokenness and failure in human relationships, and it has some religious themes, or I should say, the author clearly *thinks* that he is making an artistic commentary on spiritual themes. He portrays the father of the protagonists, who is a pastor, to be a 2-dimensional pharisee, full of reflex prejudices and social conformisms. There is nothing redeeming about the father. He is just a caricature that, no doubt, reflects author's resentment of the inadequacies of the faith of his own parents. In fact, the movie is really only "spiritual" in so far as it provides a nice portrait of how liberals view religious people, on the one hand, and depicts the spiritual impotence of faithless people on the other. The sentimentality in this movie is mind-numbing. Once again, this reflects the author's idea of the essence of the religious belief he has personally left behind. It reminds me of a movie Jane Fonda made some years ago called Golden Pond - a movie full of anti-family, anti-religious hatreds, with a veneer of sentimentality that is supposed to disarm religious people, because after all, isn't sentimentality what religion is all about? But this is by no means the most repugnant aspect of this film. This is a film full of despair, written by someone who is powerless to heal a hangnail, much less a serious spiritual disfunction, precisely because the power of living faith is completely alien to him. Obviously, tragedy and self-destructive behavior occur in families of faith, but art is like quantum measurement: it necessarily distorts what it measures, and the more explicit the ideological message, the bigger the distortion. Misery likes company, and this film is simply an invitation to the shared misery of a cynical, sorrowful, spiritually impotent liberal living in a post christian culture. There is absolutely nothing edifying or liberating in the entire film, unless you think bitter self-pity is liberating. Secularists of the sentimental sort might enjoy this opportunity to wallow in their own heartache, and outdoorsmen might enjoy the scenary. People of faith should just pass this one up. Pretty scenary does not give mystical meaning to stupid despair, nor does it vindicate it. If you are a person of faith, save your dollars for a movie created by someone who knows what faith really is. And Please don't give your money to these despairing clowns who are wise in their own eyes. They will only use it to make more vapid movies.


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