Mississippi - River of Hope
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Mississippi - River of Hope |
| Original title | The Cure |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1995 |
| length | 93 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 6 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Peter Horton |
| script | Robert Kuhn |
| production |
Mark Burg , Eric Eisner |
| music | David Grusin |
| camera | John A. Alonzo |
| cut | Anthony Sherin |
| occupation | |
| |
Mississippi - The Cure is a 1995 film directed by Peter Horton. The coming-of-age drama is about the friendship of two boys from the American state of Minnesota , one of whom is infected with HIV after a blood transfusion . Together they search - ultimately in vain - for a cure for the disease and go through a series of adventures that strengthen their friendship.
action
The drama is set in the small town of Stillwater, Minnesota, near the Mississippi River . About thirteen year old Erik is an outsider and takes refuge from school and his cold-hearted and work-addicted mother Gail, who lives separately from his father, into his own fantasy worlds, which he reenacts with action figures. The 11-year-old Dexter, who is well known to have AIDS , lives right next door and is shielded by a high wooden fence . Although Gail, who is characterized by fear and prejudice against AIDS, has forbidden her son to have any contact with Dexter, they get to know each other better one day during the summer vacation, initially by speaking through the fence without seeing each other.
Their mutual interests in games gradually lead to a friendship between them, so that Erik soon keeps secretly climbing over the fence to play with Dexter. In addition, they drive together on an air ring over streams in the neighborhood or move through Stillwater, where they are cursed as "fagots" by a group of young people from Erik's class; a reference to the "AIDS hysteria" and the associated stigmatization of homosexuals in the 80s and early 90s.
Linda, Dexter's mother, who is much more cordial and caring than Gail, soon takes Erik into her heart, so that he has dinner with them more and more often and spends his time, initially unnoticed by his own, almost always absent mother. When Erik increasingly noticed Dexter's symptoms of illness, he and his friend forged a plan to look for a plant in the surrounding nature that could cure AIDS. They also happened to learn from a newspaper headline that a New Orleans doctor claims to have found a cure for AIDS. Linda refuses to drive her to New Orleans, however, as she thinks the doctor is a charlatan after consulting the hospital.
One day Dexter eats a poisonous plant, and Linda sends the emergency doctors called to Erik, who keeps a diary with glued-in leaves of the remedies that have been tried and thus can tell them the source of the poisoning. In this way, Gail learns for the first time about her son's secret dealings with Dexter. Beside herself with anger, she beats Erik up and wants to send him to a youth camp as soon as possible in order to prevent dealing with Dexter during the rest of the summer vacation.
When Erik realizes that he is running out of time, he suggests that Dexter see the doctor in New Orleans on his own. They break out secretly from home and set out for two on a makeshift raft on a tributary to the Mississippi to get to New Orleans. They get to the Mississippi, but quickly realize that they are far too slow and that the supply of Dexter's medication with them will not be enough for the whole trip. That's why they try to go on a ship.
They manage to be taken to New Orleans on a yacht by two young men, with Erik having to spend all of his cash as "travel expenses". You are now moving much faster, but you soon noticed that after boarding two attractive women, the owners are no longer interested in getting to New Orleans by direct route, but rather in celebrating nightly boat parties. When the opportunity arises, Erik steals the men's cash he had previously discovered, they flee from the boat and arrive in a nearby town. With the stolen money they want to buy bus tickets to New Orleans, but are found at the last moment by the boat owners. After an escape ends in a dead end, Erik threatens one of the men with a knife and is in turn threatened with an even larger knife. Dexter takes his knife from Erik and cuts his hand, whereupon he holds the blood-smeared blade towards the men and reveals to them that he has AIDS and that deadly poison would flow in his veins. In this way they manage to put the men to flight.
Dexter's health deteriorates rapidly after the cut, so Erik sees no other option but to go home to be able to take him to a hospital. Without informing Dexter, he calls his mother and books a bus ticket back to Stillwater.
The rest of Dexter's life takes place in the city's hospital. As often as he can, Erik secretly visits him together with Dexter's mother Linda and tries to cheer him up, for example by Dexter pretending to be dead and Erik apparently calling in desperate nurses to scare them by Dexter jumping up. During the last of these actions, however, the child's fun turns into tragic seriousness: the doctor who is summoned can only determine the death of Dexter.
The grieving Linda brings Erik home from the hospital. Erik asks her to forgive him because he has not been able to find a cure. However, she takes him in her arms and says that he gave her son something equally important: true friendship. When they get home, Gail greets her son again in anger, beats and humiliates him. Linda asks to speak to Gail alone; During this conversation she threatens to kill her if she touches Erik again, who has just witnessed the death of his best friend and who had done so much for him.
At Dexter's funeral, Linda leaves Erik alone in the room with her boyfriend. He takes off one of his shoes and puts it in the coffin. He had given the shoe to Dexter one night during their trip to New Orleans, as he had frequent nightmares of fear of death. The shoe should show him that Erik would always be there for him and that he shouldn't be afraid even at night. At the same time, he takes one of Dexter's shoes with him and shortly afterwards lets it swim away in the small tributary in which they had previously rafted on their way to the Mississippi.
reception
Reviews
International reviews
According to Rotten Tomatoes , the original English-language version of the film received mixed reviews, 45% positive out of 11 reviews. In contrast, there are 84% positive audience ratings.
Stephen Holden gave a mixed review for the New York Times , he noted a good performance by the leading actors, who ensure that the film clearly stands out from typical hospital series in terms of emotional depth, but that it sometimes becomes too sentimental and also AIDS play down in its symptoms.
Kevin Thomas from the Los Angeles Times also gave mixed criticism that although the film as a whole manages to tell an emotional story with empathy, which is mainly due to the strong performance of the main characters, it has too many loose ends and only explains the initial situation insufficient. Furthermore, insulting the main characters as homosexuals, instead of making a plea for unconditional compassion, was inadvertently divided into gay and other AIDS sufferers.
German reviews
The Kino.de portal judges: “The sensitively constructed script by Robert Kuhn describes the friendship story of two outsiders who embark on a ' Huck Finn ' -like search for a cure. The outstanding acting performances of the two protagonists Joseph Mazzello (' Jurassic Park ') as Dexter and Brad Renfro (' The Client ') as Erik contribute to the emotional integration . "
For the lexicon of international film , it is "an insignificant touching piece of naive problem view and modest entertainment value, which also largely disappoints in terms of acting."
Awards
Brad Renfro and Joseph Mazzello both received the Young Artist Award of 1996 in the category Best Young Leading Actor: Feature Film for their portrayal of the main characters .
Gross profit
The Cure was initially conceived as a much larger production, but was eventually made as a low-budget film and cost a total of $ 3 million. It grossed a total of $ 2.56 million in the US, making it a commercial failure.
Individual evidence
- ↑ IMDb: Age ratings: The Cure Accessed August 1, 2018.
- ↑ Rotten Tomatoes: The Cure
- ^ The New York Times: FILM REVIEW; Two Boys in Quest of a Cure Retrieved August 1, 2018.
- ↑ LATimes: MOVIE REVIEW: Two Young Friends Seek 'The Cure' in AIDS Drama.Retrieved August 1, 2018.
- ↑ Kino.de: Mississippi - River of Hope. Accessed August 1, 2018.
- ↑ Mississippi - River of Hope. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed August 1, 2018 .
- ↑ Internet Movie Database: Mississippi - River of Hope. Retrieved August 1, 2018.