The Mosquito Coast (Peter Weir)

[Johann]

I've known about The Mosquito Coast ever since it came out in the 80's but I only saw it for the first time on DVD recently.

It a great little movie, but the ending irritated me a lot.
Harrison Ford is a "visionary" inventor who believes the end of the world is near.
He packs up his family (wife Helen Mirren and son River Phoenix and another boy unknown to me) and heads to the amazon to "survive" the holocaust. Is dad insane? off his rocker? a Genius? We get clues through the whole film of both.

The ending irritated me because it could have gone on for another hour- if they didn't make sure we knew dad was dead.


Anyone see it?
Care to discuss?

[Chris Knipp]

I read the book and saw the movie. It's the story of a crazy but totally charismatic father whom his children follow slavishly. The "other boy" you refer to I guess is Jadrien Steele. He continued to act but didn't become famous as River Phoenix did, already essentially was from STAND BY ME. This is how River met Martha Plimpton, who became one of the women of his life, along with Samantha Mathis. The book is a real page-turner -- Paul Theroux is a good writer of travel stories -- and the movie is pretty good, if not great. It is good for the relationship between Phoenix and Plimpton and the narrative adventure drive. Maybe you're right that the ending is unsatisfactory. It's hard to remember. This began my fascination with River Phoenix, because I didn't respond as much to STAND BY ME, though the one that really grabbed me is the wonderful RUNNING ON EMPTY. Then I went back to watch JIMMY REARDON and LITTLE NIKITA. I like I LOVE YOU TO DEATH, but the big one after RUNNING ON EMPTY is MY OWN PRIVATE IDAHO. THE THING CALLED LOVE is a great movie, too little known. Everything he did is gold. I long to see DARK BLOOD, which opened in Rotterdam, as I mentioned because the cinematographer Ed Lachman went there from the NYFF. It was interrupted by River Phoenix's death, but George Sluizer has done an edit of it. I recommend THE THING CALLED BLOOD, directed by Peter Bogdonovich. It will surprise you. Also see RUNNING ON EMPTY if you have not. River is together with Martha Plimpton again and the chemistry is part of the magic.

[Johann]

Martha Plimpton is cute in this movie. Her scenes are very brief even though her character figures prominently later on.
River Phoenix is good as Harrison Ford's son, and he is dedicated to his father. He tells Martha on a boat: "My Father is a genius".
She tells him she thinks about him when she goes to the bathroom. (?)

The film seems prophetic when you first watch it. This is how it might possibly go down, for some man who feels the end of the world is nigh. The speed with which Harrison builds his haven in the jungle is amazing, and the detail with which it was built (a Hollywood crew in reality) is impressive. With no laws, this is how someone might build an oasis, especially with his ability to make ice.

The prophecy disappears when reality sets in: did he not plan for invaders? He had no weapons of any kind.
Eventually even the remotest parts of the earth have visitors, and most of them have guns.
That's why the ending irritated me: it's almost laughably predictable what happens in the second half.
Why didn't he just move deeper into the jungle or take off to another place altogether? And why didn't he explain more to his family as things go from bad to worse? They think he's bonkers precisely because he refuses to let them in on his plans or thoughts.
When River finally bails on his Dad, the scene where he's trying to convince his Mom to go with him and his brother in the truck is great.
"I Can't!!" she helplessly says. It's different for her than it is for her kids.

The overhead shot of the snaking river told me that the movie was over and it bugged me.
It could have been a whole other movie, the reaction to the armageddon plans going wrong.
But no, they wrap it up with Dad dead on the boat, and no indication what will happen to the family.
(But my guess is they go back to the U.S.A. and write a book, go on the talk show circuit). LOL

[Chris Knipp]

When I saw this film I had already read the novel by Paul Theroux, which is a real page-turner. If you read it, you may find out if it has a more satisfactory ending. I don't remember. Hollywood movies do have a tendency to change book's endings. Of course Charlie Fox (River Phoenix) says his father Allie is "a genius." The story has a classic, parable quality. Allie is the epitome of the charismatic nut case. The people around him -- in this case just his family -- follow him slavishly, even though his project is absurd and doomed. "Fat Boy," the ice machine, is the epitome of the impossible project. The idea of selling ice to remote tribesmen. Sure, a way to become as important as a god -- or just to throw away one's life. Charlie has the strength of will to break away.

I remember Emily (Martha Plimpton in the movie) saying to Charlie "I think of you when I go to the bathroom." It's a completely innocent, pre-sexual way of saying she's sexually attracted to him. To me it's significant because River and Martha (who always projects intelligence and self-possession in her performances) became real-life lovers later on as a result of meeting for the shoot of MOSQUITO COAST. This also le to the pair having a relationship in RUNNING ON EMPTY.

The Wikipedia article on the film, which I'm looking at now, recounts that Jack Nicohlson was going to play the lead but dropped out because he couldn't watch the LA Lakers from Belize, where most of the action was shot. Then there was trouble with funding, which was lost. Then Weir, with Harrison Ford, had great success with the film WITNESS, and they were able to get funding again. Ford's working with River Phoenix on this led to Phoenix being given the role of the young Indiana Jones, his first and arguably his only big blockbuster role.

Also parable-like is the presence of Spellgood (Andre Gregory), the Christian missionary. Needless to say Theroux has no use for religious zealots and Spellgood is the villain of the piece who ruins everything. But Allie Fox has led his family on a useless, doomed mission with pipe dreams and delusions of grandeur and destruction. He makes his family believe in his fantasies by the force of his personality -- and because he has tremendous energy, will, and definite skills and talents (his inventions).

Doesn't Allie's carrying the ice from Fat Boy to the remote tribe with the help of his two sons remind you of something out of Werner Herzog?

[Chris Knipp]

The overhead shot of the snaking river told me that the movie was over and it bugged me.
It could have been a whole other movie, the reaction to the armageddon plans going wrong.
But no, they wrap it up with Dad dead on the boat, and no indication what will happen to the family.

I can't comment on this. It's been too long since I saw the movie. And I saw the movie after having read the book, so where there were differences both versions were in my mind, overlapping. I don't know how "it could have been a whole other movie," given that it's made from a bestselling book. And I can't see how the movie's ending is unsatisfactory. To my mind the pleasure of the story as with many stories is in the story, not in the ending. Is it so important how it ends?

The Wikipdia summary concludes:
The film concludes with the group traveling downriver again, where Allie drifts in and out of consciousness. Allie asks his wife if they are going upstream. She lies to him - going against the wishes of her husband for the first time. Charlie's final narration reports the death of Allie, but gives hope that the rest of the family can live their lives freely from now on.

I think it's the essence of the story, the novel, that the family is in thrall to Allie and his mad dreams and megalomaniac, paranoid vidions of armageddon, which he thinks he can save them from. His death is the only thing that can release them from the prison of his dominant vision. So his death is a happy thing, a liberation -- even though there is also a fascination in Allie's fantasy world. It's so much richer than most people's. It's fun while it lasts, even though there's the constant sickly feeling that it's all clearly doomed.

[Chris Knipp]

Theroux is a great travel writer. He wront several books just about traveling by train through India. He doesn't come through as at all a nice person (see also his memoir of V.S. Naipaul) but he's extremely resilent and a tireless traveler with a keen sense of humor and terrific descriptive abilities. To me this novel was an extension of his travel books.

I probably wasn't completely convinced by Harrison Ford. He's impressive as a person but not the greatest actor (it would have been interesting to see what Jack Nicholson cuold have made of the role of Allie Fox -- he'd have been funnier, and more terrifying). I'm surprised to learn that Helen Mirren plays "Mother." I don't think I knew who she was then. Though she had already been in THE LONG GOOD FRIDAY (arguably a better movies and better role) and way before that had had a role in O LUCKY MAN! Probably what made the most impression on me was River Phoenix and his relationship with Martha Plimpton. I liked seeing this movie because I'd enjoyed the book, but I can think of better ones by PETER WEIR, in particular WITNESS and DEAD POET'S SOCIETY.

The way the Christian missionaries are represented is stereotyped, reflecting Theroux's prejudices and simplistic mindset, his easy ability to dismiss people completely and instantly. (I have found him better and more memorable as a non-fiction writer than a novelist.)

Hey: Paul Schrader wrote the screenplay from Theroux's book. So that's interesting. Of course much earlier PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK. At the time of MOSQUITO COAST he was on a roll, since they all came close together, WITNESS, that, DEAD POET'S SOCIETY. Then it was nine years before THE TRUMAN SHOW.

[Johann]

Interesting about Jack Nicholson- I didn't know that he was going to be in it.
It has echoes of Werner Herzog- definitely. And Jack was also supposed to be in Fitzcarraldo, another jungle movie that seemed doomed by Herzog.
Jack couldn't live in the Peruvian jungle for months- because of NBA basketball? maybe.
The ice machine Allie invented is cool, but it was quite ridiculous to see the full-scale version in the jungle.
It's like, 3 stories tall, with valves and vents and massive sheets of corrugated metal (aluminum?).
Where did he get all those supplies? They just appear! and did they all help to symmetrically corrugate the metal? or did it arrive that way, pre-fabricated?
And that explosion that kills the baddies in it was larger than life- way too "movie explosion".

The Christian Missionaries are exposed as arrogant and presumptuous- just like they were in Stallone's last Rambo (2008).
I loved the dialogue between Allie and the main "villian Christian"- they both quote scripture, with Allie ad-libbing a brutal cut-down.
He relies on science, not God.

When the kids realize what's going on, that's when the film gets some tension. They have to flee, and Allie is giving hints that they can fuck off without him if they like- a sure sign Dad is losing it. When they find out that America was not obliterated the movie becomes a character study. A character study of a family barely held together- and only because of the circumstances of sheer elemental survival.
That's why I said it could be a whole other movie.
The family has a new situation- their patriarch is dead, and they aren't too upset by it. No one sobs uncontrollably, everyone knows how and why what they are living happened. What will they tell the authorities? The media? That they were prisoners of their father's/husband's folly and now they are free? People will wonder if they killed him themselves, out of sheer terror. Who witnessed the shooting?

Probably the most interesting character is the black "local" man who helped them build the oasis.
He turned out to be an interesting fellow, huh? He flipped it on them.
He predicted the weather like he lived there his whole life- which he did.
I thought to myself that he was someone you'd probably get in a jungle- someone helping you as a somewhat uncivilized "man of the land" but actually knowing WAY more than he lets on. Knowing things that could save your bacon in this new, wild frontier.

All in all, this movie gets a thumbs up. I haven't read the book so I can't compare- thanks for the notes on Theroux Chris.
It does go from event to event in rather quick fashion:

Ice machine
Pack up and go
Build the camp/oasis
hijacked
explosion
Flee/storm
Allie shot
credits

But the cinematography was excellent and the acting was decent. Polished movie, from a polished film director.

[Chris Knipp]

I think it already is a character study, so I don't quite get what the "whole other movie" you envision is. Do you mean continuing to show what happens to the family after Allie dies? Indeed the kids wanting to escape from the crazy domination of their father is what creates the tension. He's locked into a fantasy that cannot be realized and they're locked in it too but against their will. When Charlie tells Martha Pliimpton "My father's a genius," he's reciting the mantra he has to tell himself, but it gets harder and harder to believe as everything goes wrong. At the very least the adjective "crazy" must be inserted in front of "genius."

Most of this, such as the reasons why Nicholson didn't take the role, what he did do, how MOSQUITO COAST did, and details of production, is largely answered in the Wikipedia article, "Mosquito Coast." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mosquito_Coast)

I think it's a good movie, but I still think the book is better, and you ought to read it if you like the story. I couldn't put it down. I read so hard I almost felt sick. I finished it in one or two sittings. It's compulsive reading. Theroux is a good storyteller. Weir is good too. More than anything I was fascinated by the thought that making the movie on location with harsh conditions and a small film crew must have felt a lot like the experience of the story itself. No wonder Martha and River were thrown together. It must have been intense, like Werner Herzog's shoots.

Of course not being able to watch the Lakers wasn't the only reason Jack Nicholson didn't take the role. You'll find much more detail in the Wikipedia article, "The Mosquito Coast (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mosquito_Coast)," which I cited earlier.

[Johann]

Yes- continuing the movie after he dies is what I meant by another movie. We're left hanging, even if River Phoenix gives us a voiceover.
I wasn't satisfied at all with the ending. We're just supposed to accept things as they are. Lots of questions linger!!!

Harrison Ford said that of all of the roles he's played, this one is his favorite.

[Chris Knipp]

That's kind of admirable in Harrison Ford, and also he had to defend it in the face of generally poor reviews and the fact that it lost money.

As always in these cases I'd like to match up the end of the movie with the end of the book and see if the movie botched something that was more satisfying in the book, or if both endings are unsatisfying. Screenwriters and filmmakers are wont to tinker with endings as we all know.

By the way though I saw the film at least 18 years ago, I saw it on video, not in a theater, myself also.