A former soldier of the Boer war arrives in New Zealand (1903) for reasons unknown (vacation?). Shortly thereafter a British soldier is killed in a conflict with a Maori (native New Zealander) when the soldier and his drinking buddies discover the Maori with a white woman in a barn. The Maori at the time was on a break from a whaling ship on which he served as a harpooner. On learning of the killing, the commander of the soldiers quickly organizes a hunting party with a tracker. He also enlists the aid of the Boer guy that may or may not be on vacation to assist his tracker. There is a nice reward of 100 sovereigns for the Maori alive and 25 dead. This guy needs the money, folks. No other reason to help the British soldiers. And so off they go into the wild.
This movie is a little over an hour and a half but feels like two. This is because of the time spent with dull tracking of quarry and dull conversations with quarry. Who doesn't like a good chase or hunt? But in order to have that you have to find what the hunter and hunted are doing interesting. So (1) you need to get a real sense of their cleverness or ingenuity in trying to capture and avoid capture. And (2) there has to be a heightening of suspense based on a closing of the gap between them and a real sense of their desperation or motivation to succeed as a result; --whatever the cost.
But in this movie I never felt that (1) anyone was being particularly cunning. They did the standard things we've all seen before; broke a branch to make it look like this is where someone went and backtracked over tracks to misdirect. This might have been clever at one time but now it's standard practice even for morons. And (2) I felt the tracking or pursuit in this movie was too leisurely; with the pursuer acting like he was just out for a stroll and not hunting a dangerous killer and the pursued acting like he was playing a little game of hide and seek with an old friend and not in peril for his life. The relationship between these two men bordered on comedy which made me think that maybe the producers should have just said "F!!ck it!" and gone that route. Perhaps they intended --at least in part-- that the movie be a "character study" of the two men; learning what motivated them and who they were thru civil conversation. In other words: Even though I've got a rope around your neck that doesn't mean we can't share. Love, Boloxxxi.
This movie is a little over an hour and a half but feels like two. This is because of the time spent with dull tracking of quarry and dull conversations with quarry. Who doesn't like a good chase or hunt? But in order to have that you have to find what the hunter and hunted are doing interesting. So (1) you need to get a real sense of their cleverness or ingenuity in trying to capture and avoid capture. And (2) there has to be a heightening of suspense based on a closing of the gap between them and a real sense of their desperation or motivation to succeed as a result; --whatever the cost.
But in this movie I never felt that (1) anyone was being particularly cunning. They did the standard things we've all seen before; broke a branch to make it look like this is where someone went and backtracked over tracks to misdirect. This might have been clever at one time but now it's standard practice even for morons. And (2) I felt the tracking or pursuit in this movie was too leisurely; with the pursuer acting like he was just out for a stroll and not hunting a dangerous killer and the pursued acting like he was playing a little game of hide and seek with an old friend and not in peril for his life. The relationship between these two men bordered on comedy which made me think that maybe the producers should have just said "F!!ck it!" and gone that route. Perhaps they intended --at least in part-- that the movie be a "character study" of the two men; learning what motivated them and who they were thru civil conversation. In other words: Even though I've got a rope around your neck that doesn't mean we can't share. Love, Boloxxxi.