- You don't need anyone! Nobody needs anyone now! You stupid farmer! For Americans, the topic of the struggle for their land is quite relevant, for the simple reason that they themselves preferred to take foreign land, calling it their own. So it was when these glorious comrades had just landed off the coast of America and began to drive the Indians from their native places. Of course, they then set up reservations for the few survivors of that, not even the war, but the slaughter of the whites. And of course, about the valiant Indians who fight for freedom, many films have been made, but you can not throw out the history of words. Americans have always been famous for their aggressive policy, adhering to the rule that “what is mine is mine and what is not mine will soon be mine,” and naturally they are not used to the attempts of the authorities to take their land. And who would put up with it? There are a lot of films on the subject, one of which is right in front of you. So this is the river.
The Garvir family lives on an old farm and barely makes ends meet. They owed a huge amount to the bank, the crop was destroyed by the spring flood, and the head of the family, Tom Garvey, has neither rich relatives, nor connections, nor any other work to pay the bills. In general, wherever you throw a wedge. But in order to make life seem like honey to farmers, clever entrepreneur Joe Wade buys up the lands of their neighbors, pursuing the goal of flooding the valley where the Garvers site is located and building a hydroelectric power plant. Naturally, the main character does not want to put up with such a state of affairs, because this land belonged to his distant ancestors and Tom enters into an open confrontation with a charismatic entrepreneur. What's gonna happen? Look and find out.
And yes, there is something to see in this film, because the viewer appears quite atypical drama. Atypical because in the film there are situations that threaten the main characters with death. Listing these situations does not make any sense, since firstly there are quite a lot of them, and secondly it can spoil your viewing experience. So in this scenario, the usual drama about family values grows into an action-packed drama, the leitmotif of which is that the Garvir family is fighting against the whole world, well, or a single village and adjoining a provincial town, which for the main characters is “the whole world”. But the film leaves more questions than answers, and the behavior of the characters from the moral and ethnic side also raises questions. Let me try to explain.
For starters, we're talking about a lot of people losing their farms to debt and having to sell all their possessions to get away from here. It's understandable, but when all the farmers started telling their friend not to leave, what did the protagonist do? Started talking about how to live like this? Or maybe he supported the fire farmer with a kind word or no less kind deed? Nope. Tom Garvey is only an outside observer in this case and the opinion of the hero will remain with him. The question is, what does everyone respect Tom Garvey for if throughout the film he hasn't done anything truly heroic and inspired people to lead them? Of course, we can say that all people are good and God sees, I myself want to believe that people around them are better than they seem at first glance, but the cold cynic in me says that good returns to a person only when he is not indifferent to someone else’s trouble and in no other way. The next question is about people who have lost their farms. So, their families have nothing to eat, they have nothing to live on, and at the same time they help the person who has both. I understand that you don’t want someone to repeat your fate, but this farmer is poor and the harvest of the main character will not go to feed hungry mouths, we all remember that Tom Garvey is a terrible egotist, but to cover debts. It's all so sweet and so American. Well, the last storyline with the aforementioned billionaire. So, before the viewer there is a typical businessman who adheres to the rule that good my business will be good and others. Do you think the valley will flood? But people will have jobs, and most importantly, do not have to worry about the river that constantly overflows and threatens flooding all the surrounding farms. Ultimately, it is extremely expensive to lend money to people who sit on a powder keg. And you really expect a mental, maybe even physical, confrontation between Tom Garvey and Joe Wade, but it doesn't happen. Heroes just drill each other's eyes and that's all. No recriminations, no threats. There was no attempt to frame the farmer. All of this seems too playful and sterile.
Summing up, I want to say that in this picture there are both good actors and a tense atmosphere, but they are trying to impose morality on the viewer and show that all people living in this world are kind, but stupid. People are willing to help themselves and their families. That the help of others should be taken for granted and not help in return. That having made many unfortunate mistakes in life, one should not try to become smarter, but keep making mistakes, obviously in the hope of wringing one’s stupid neck. In fact, the film can be seen at leisure and you can even get some pleasure from it, but only if you do not take the events shown films for the truth in the last resort.
5 out of 10