The Sunchaser

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Movie
German title The Sunchaser
Original title Sunchaser
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1996
length 127 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Michael Cimino
script Charles Leavitt
production Arnon Milchan ,
Michael Cimino,
Larry Spiegel
music Maurice Jarre
camera Doug Milestone
cut Joe D'Augustine
occupation

The Sunchaser (alternative title: Sunchaser - The Search for the Holy Mountain ) is the last film by director Michael Cimino , made in 1996 . Woody Harrelson and Jon Seda star, and Academy Award winner Anne Bancroft in a minor role. Charles Leavitt wrote the script.

In the USA, the film started on September 27, 1996 and was shown there for only one week in a maximum of 23 cinemas. The video premiere in Germany was on May 23, 1997.

action

The Los Angeles of the present: The successful oncologist Michael Reynolds, an overachiever who quickly gets to work in his $ 176,000 Porsche 911 Turbo ( diegetic music at this point: "What a Difference a Day Makes", Esther Phillips ) examines on one 16-year-old serious criminal Brandon 'Blue' Monroe developed a tumor. Monroe is on trial for the murder of his stepfather and an armed robbery. There is no prospect of improvement; on the contrary, the CT shows an end-stage peritoneal sarcoma . The chemotherapy has made him bald and demonstratively smokes in front of the doctors. Reynolds is shocked by Monroe's vulgar manner and doesn't quite know how to deal with the antisocial boy. Suddenly, despite security guards and security measures, he is taken hostage in his own hospital thanks to a smuggled firearm. The outbreak had been prepared for a long time.

Monroe, who only has weeks to live, pulls the frightened doctor out onto the street and swaps a gang member's sports car for a hastily repainted car that turns out to be drivable. Monroe seems to have a specific plan and is single-minded and quick. At gunpoint, he forces Dr. Reynolds, racing out of LA.

At the beginning you saw Monroe with his mystical favorite book "The Man Who Travels" in the prisoner transport - more a dime book. He is half- Navajo on his father's side , and knows stories of a healing sacred mountain from his ancestors in Arizona , which he must reach alive at all costs. So he learned from this story. The under normal circumstances rather superficial and egocentric Dr. Reynolds does n't think much of natural religions and esotericism . First they have to find the medicine man Skyhorse on the reservation , whom Monroe knows from before and who knows about the rite.

Police cars are after them and Monroe lets Reynolds go full throttle. Intermediate stations follow: an explosive confrontation with a biker gang, a slightly surreal confrontation with an older, spiritually receptive hippie lady who lives in the wilderness and an encounter with gospel-singing churchgoers. To make matters worse, Reynolds is bitten by a rattlesnake in the desert before they even reach Flagstaff . Monroe succeeds in neutralizing the snake venom with an electric shock from the car battery. From now on, Monroe's health deteriorated rapidly; at the same time, the mood between the unequal men normalizes somewhat. A prayer from "The Man Who Travels" has to offer comfort to Monroe more and more often. Despite the hopelessness of the whole undertaking and although the police are to be expected, the boy does not abandon his plan and his obscure beliefs . Then they meet Skyhorse's granddaughter and finally himself, who guides them.

Monroe would actually release Reynolds, but near Shiprock he is in desperate need of antibiotics, and Reynolds breaks into a hospital for him. As a result, Reynolds decides to stay with him. From there they climb the Holy Mountain.

A police helicopter catches up with the fugitives. All the color has literally gone from Monroe's face, he is sweating and shaking all over. The kidnapping has become a terminal care. Dr. Reynolds' worldview and self-image have changed for the better. The experience made him remember the last days of his brother, who died similarly. At the end of the long chase and the climb of the mountain range, Reynolds has to carry him, so to speak, they reach the holy mountain and the magic lake on its summit. With a happy “ May completion be before me. May completion be behind me. May completion be upon me. May completion be under me. May completion be all around me. “(Original: beauty ) Monroe disappears over the water, in the noise and downdraft of the helicopter. He becomes one with the landscape.

criticism

The Sunchaser received a 17% rating from Rotten Tomatoes out of 6 reviews; the average rating is 4/10. The Lexicon of International Films said that the film was “an endeavored road movie version that celebrates mythical, pre-Columbian America ” and “ hardly convincing as an examination of rationality and spirituality ”. The “blurred image of America” was criticized. Stephen Holden wrote in the New York Times that the film was a "mishmash of action, mysticism and department store psychology" and "clings to some agonizing childhood flashbacks in its credibility". Todd McCarthy judged in the industry journal Variety that the staging was sufficiently powerful, but the Reynolds character was annoying towards the end due to a lack of character development and depth. The camera work by Doug Milestone was okay, and the editing was also successful, but the background music by Maurice Jarre could be more subtle.

Others

Nominations

Sunchaser was in 1996 in competition for the Palme d'Or in Cannes, but the award went to Secrets and Lies by Mike Leigh .

literature

  • Michael Cimino: Michel Cimino Interviewed by Serge Toubiana . In: Cahiers du cinéma . June 1996.
  • Jacquelyn Kilpatrick: Celluloid Indians: Native Americans and Film . University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln 1999, ISBN 0-8032-7790-3 , pp. 156 ff . (English, books.google.com ).
  • Maurizia Natali: The Sublime Excess of the American Landscapes: “Dances with Wolves” and “Sunchaser” as Healing Landscapes . In: Cinémas: revue d'études cinématographiques . tape 12 , no. 1 , 2001, ISSN  1705-6500 , doi : 10.7202 / 024870ar (English, erudit.org [PDF]).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release dates for The Sunchaser (1996). In: IMDb . Retrieved March 1, 2008 .
  2. ↑ The Sunchaser. In: Box Office Mojo. Retrieved March 2, 2008 .
  3. ↑ a b Catholic Institute for Media Information [KIM] and Catholic Film Commission for Germany (ed.): Lexicon of International Films . Cinema, television, video, DVD . Zweiausendeins, Frankfurt am Main 2002, ISBN 3-86150-455-3 , p. 3127 .
  4. ^ The Sunchaser (1996). Rotten Tomatoes , accessed December 23, 2014 .
  5. ↑ Stephen Holden : On the Bumpy Road to Magic Healing. In: The New York Times . October 25, 1996, accessed on December 23, 2014 (English): "Sunchaser, an overwrought hodgepodge of action, mysticism and dime-store psychology, pins the credibility of its story on some tortured childhood flashbacks [...]"
  6. ^ Todd McCarthy: Review: 'The Sunchaser'. Variety , May 20, 1996, accessed March 1, 2008 .
  7. ↑ Filming locations for The Sunchaser (1996). In: IMDb . Retrieved March 1, 2008 .
  8. ^ Sunchaser (1996). In: Hollywood.com. Retrieved March 1, 2008 .
  9. ↑ Washington Matthews: The Night Chant, a Navaho ceremony. Memoirs of the AMNH . tape 6 . The Knickerbocker Press, New York 1902, pp. 76 (English, hdl.handle.net ).
  10. ↑ cf. Kilpatrick: p. 161.