Thursday, December 29, 2016

The Dark Valley (2014)

A tight-lipped stranger by the name of Greider (Sam Riley) rides into a town in the Austrian Alps. He wants to stay for the winter but the townsfolk, at first, tell him to get along until they learn he is a photographer with a daguerreotype camera. He ends up rooming with a widowed woman and her daughter and witnesses how the entire town is under the control of an old man named Brenner and his six ruthless sons. When two die under mysterious circumstances suspicion falls on Greider especially after the one is found with nails in his eyes—nails like Greider was seen purchasing at the town store. He goes into hiding and his family's connection to the remote town is revealed before, yes, you guessed it, the climatic shoot-out. A dour, slow moving German film (subtitled but easy to read) that I enjoyed though there's nothing new here other than its stunning locale.

2 comments:

Prashant C. Trikannad said...

This sounds like a regular Western except that it's set in an Austrian town. I like watching such films.

David Cranmer said...

I enjoyed it, Prashant, especially the lead actor's performance.