The Dead Don't Hurt (15)

Danish immigrant Holger Olsen meets French Canadian flower seller Vivienne Le Coudy and woos her away from pompous art dealer Lewis Cartwright. The couple move into Holger's ramshackle cabin on the outskirts of a small town run and owned by corrupt mayor Rudolph Schiller and influential businessman Alfred Jeffries. Holger wears the sheriff's badge with pride but he is powerful to prevent sickening violence close to home.

LondonNet Film Review

The Dead Don’t Hurt (15) Film Review from LondonNet

Dead men tell no tales and sometimes, the living also prefer silence. Moments of quiet reflection and lamentation punctuate actor Viggo Mortensen’s second directorial feature, a slow-burning revenge thriller set before and during the US Civil War, which pits neighbouring states against each other. The Dead Don’t Hurt is more ambitious in scope than his accomplished 2020 debut Falling, chronicling the fractious relationship between a gay man and his cantankerous, ageing father…

Intergenerational conflict also lights the dramatic fuse here but the consequences are graphically violent and potentially deadly at a time when heartfelt prayers could be just as impactful to survival as the limited supplies in a doctor’s medicine bag. The intentionally fractured chronology of Mortensen’s script withholds an expected emotional sucker punch until the conclusion of the first hour, sowing seeds of rage and retribution in a second half that noticeably picks up pace to an energetic trot.

Mortensen reunites with top-line creatives from his first picture including production designer Carol Spier, art director Jason Clarke and Danish cinematographer Marcel Zyskind to conjure majestic panoramas of the American West. Vicky Krieps invests her strong-willed homemaker with a steeliness and self-reliance that makes her character’s fate truly heartbreaking. She sparks delightful screen chemistry with a gruff and stoic Mortensen, whose impressive multi-tasking extends to composing the film’s mournful score.

Danish immigrant Holger Olsen (Mortensen) meets French Canadian flower seller Vivienne Le Coudy (Krieps) and woos her away from pompous art dealer Lewis Cartwright (Colin Morgan). The couple move into Holger’s ramshackle cabin on the outskirts of a small town run and owned by corrupt mayor Rudolph Schiller (Danny Huston) and influential businessman Alfred Jeffries (Garret Dillahunt). Holger wears the sheriff’s badge with pride while Vivienne finds work behind the bar of the only saloon for miles managed by Alan Kendall (W Earl Brown), which is frequented by Jeffries and his hot-headed son Weston (Solly McLeod).

With his father’s money as protection, Weston rampages drunkenly through town and tells his old man that he “ain’t some lickfinger you can push around”. Primal desires have sickening repercussions and innocent people are caught in the crossfire including simple-minded Ed Wilkins (Alex Breaux) and sheriff’s deputy Billy Crossley (Shane Graham).

Opening with soft, rhythmic breathing on a deathbed, The Dead Don’t Hurt sits comfortably in the saddle of a genre that frequently takes innocent lives with the reckless pull of a trigger. Gunfights on foot and horseback are well executed. Supporting characters are convincingly fleshed out, stoking tension between townsfolk down to the Bible-spouting judge of a kangaroo court, who justifies a perversion of justice with verbose scripture. The guilty cannot escape righteous punishment forever.

– Sarah Lee