The Dark Valley (2014)

Andreas Prochaska's The Dark Valley is a dark, grimly paced Euro-western that could have been a great one if only the script was as tight and polished as it's musical and stylistic elements. Shot in the Italian mountains, it looks absolutely alluring in every single frame, blessed with a stoic tough-guy performance from Sam Riley as a mysterious stranger bent on revenge and a soundtrack full of odd, against-the-grain yet distinct choices. It looks, sounds and feels evocative, but the story that should go alongside and string it all together is just too loosely woven, and as such, interest is lost. Riley's stranger is not really welcome in the alpine town, especially by the Brenners, a local crime family that rule the roost. It's a harsh winter, and pretty soon bodies start piling up, victims of an unseen assailant the townspeople just assume is the Stranger. There's a backstory to the whole thing, some great atrocity committed by these folk decades earlier, and while all the information was presented, in both exposition and flashback, it just didn't have the emotional payoff or clear-cut grandiosity that a western like this should, especially one as dramatic in every other area. The dubbing over of the German actors doesn't help one bit either, a choice which I will never, ever support. Subtitles all the way, man. Anyways, Riley is as awesome as ever, it's really sad that he doesn't make more films, he's got a dark star quality that immediately classes up any film he shows up in. The cinematography is top shelf, with a stunning backdrop of mountains all round, detailed period-appropriate production design and costume work. Music is a strong point, with a neat opening credit rendition of Nina Simone's Sinner Man, and there's a climactic gunfight that leaps off the screen in bold strokes. It's just a little less than it should be in areas where the stakes needed to be way higher and draw us into the story, so that when the operatic violence comes, it has heft beyond just looking cool and leaving us nothing to invest our care in. Good stuff, if incomplete.

Even though it takes place between the snowy mountains of austria, this western style movie is a tribute to all the old ones and so it goes just the same way. Hero rides into a village to avenge his family, kills all the bad guys, frees the village and rides of. There's very little dialogue the movie and the story is somewhat straightforward and predictable, offering barely any surprise or tension.Worst thing were the accents for me. I watched the movie in "German", but their accent was often so strong and they swallowed whole letters, which made it hard to understand at times. I actually had to activate subtitles for this.The scenery is okay and it sure is impressive enough that such a movie is an austrian-German cooperation project. But besides that there's nothing special here. Average stuff, no less, no more.

The favourable reviews here have already highlighted the cinematography, the gratifyingly minimal dialogue, (I think I've seen and heard so much clichéd dialogue in recent cinema that the dialogue in this film is a blessed relief from that), and the beautiful setting of a high alpine village in winter. The story itself is no great shakes, but what is made of it is. Best film I've seen on Amazon for the longest time. The central characters don't need to be fully fleshed out because neither the story nor the genre demands it. I thought the whole thing was written around a repeating rifle, but I'm probably wrong.

I came upon this movie not knowing anything about it. All I knew was that the main character was an actor I found to be truly wonderful in another movie I had seen. I really enjoyed this movie a lot! It was well written. The small details here and there really helped make the movie even better! From the costume to the scenery, the animals,and the characters. Every little touch such as ice in a bowl were just perfect. I found the story enjoyable enough to want to watch it again and again. The opening song says it all, you just have to listen and you might not fully know it's meaning until you've seen the movie through to the end.