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Rating:  -
First off a heads up on this one that you want to watch the credits until the end for this film, not because there is an other scene at the end, but rather a sort of spoken benediction. This is something different to toss in at the end of a film, but then this is a film that is decidedly different.
The town of Northfork was established around the time of the Declaration of Independence in what would eventually become Montana and it is going to cease to exist in 1955 when a new dam which will provide power for the rest of the state creates the biggest lake west of the Mississippi (that does not have a ridiculously high salt content) puts it underwater. That will make living in the town impossible, but there are a few folk who are not inclined to leave. Therefore a trio of two-man evacuation teams and sent in to the area to persuade these people to get out while the getting is good (they will be paid in lake front property in the brand new world that will be created by the dam). Of course, the ones that are left will be tough nuts to crack. There are the people who start shooting shotguns at the Evacuators (you have to love that name) and the guy who has built an ark to ride out the rising waters. Then there is Father Harlan (Nick Nolte) who is prepared to leave but cannot leave the side of Irwin (Duel Farnes), a young boy who is too sick to be moved.
There is a fork in the road for "Northfork" and Irwin has a counterpart in Walter O'Brien (James Woods), one of the Evacuators. Walter is driving the dusty roads in his black sedan, doing what he can to get these people to move. His face is as rugged and dusty as the bleak landscape of the Montana landscape before the coming deluge. Walter is of the earth, but Irwin is of the air. At least that is the conclusion we want to draw when we see the conversation he is having, presumably in his mind, with a quartet of angels. Having been returned to the priest by his adoptive parents, Irwin has come to belief that he is the lost angel of local lore, who has fallen to Earth and had his wings amputated by humans. Surely the angels have come to return him home.
The angels are the asexual Flower Hercules (Daryl Hannah), an asexual looking creature, the talkative Cup of Tea (Robin Sachs), the mute cowboy Cod (Ben Foster), and Happy (Anthony Edwards), who needs his bizarre glasses to see what cannot be seen. This part of the story plays either way, but of course the lyrical touches the heartstrings more. This 2003 film is my first by the Polish brothers: Mark writes and acts while Michael writes and directs. Since the DVD extras inform me this is the third film in their trilogy, following "Twin Falls, Idaho" and "Jackpot," I was thinking starting at this end might be a mistake. But it is not that type of trilogy (think Baz Lurhmann rather than Peter Jackson), plus "Northfork" was the first of the three scripts that they wrote although the last produced, so I do not feel too bad about it.
For me how everything came together at the end did not quite add up to magic. I did not mind the languorous pacing of the film, having decried the frantic camera movement and constant cuts, and the slow approach fits the setting and the story. Obviously this is not an easy film and if you do not really appreciate a film making more sense the second time around (or in retrospect, once you have given it some thought), then "Northfork" will not be, given the above, your cup of tea. Then again if this quirky film really works for you it could be an eccentric hit in your collection. It certainly has enough going for it for me to want to check out the other films by the Polish brothers, even if they prove to be as challenging as this one.
Rating:  -
but thats about it Dont get me wrong I try to get into these weirded out movies like "Brazil" where everything can be a metaphor for something else. Like when your talking to someone and they mention the big mac they had yesterday when an obese person walks by but its gotta MAKE SOME SENSE! C'mon folks 'Northfork' made none it was just a trippy flashback of times when the directors played with LSD in college. And the joke HAHAHAHAHAH. We've all heard it 'God says I already sent a boat and a helicopter dummy' did that have to be such a drawn out scene? No but it was because they were short on dialogue. It started out on paper as something that couldve been special but winded up with everyone being happy with Noltes, Woods, Hannah and Edwards performances which were well acted out pieces of insanity. 2 stars.
Rating:  -
There is a strange beauty and subtle intrigue to this film that could have been developed into a real movie. What emerges, though, is esotericism to the point of annoyance and quirkiness to the point of becoming soporific. No, all you so-called enlightened reviewers, who cast aspersions at the purported twenty-somethings with dull perspectives who did not enjoy this film...many of the viewers of this film are actually well versed in good movies and really gave this one a chance. Unfortunately, many of you hubris peddlers seem to carry around so much intellectual haughtiness in your brains that you always mistake strangeness and originality for genius. Yes, many of the movies we see today are stupid - but the solution doesn't immediately lie in morphine-like flighty, abstruse David Lynch rip-offs.
We really attempted to stretch our imaginations around such vague scenes as the one with the "men in black" ordering at the diner. When we saw the luminous alien vixen played by Hannah, we hoped that we were going to take part in something as magical as Bladerunner. We deftly ignored much of the idiotic dialogue with pointless pop culture references and talk of smelly outhouses.
There were some scenes that delighted. The libertarian bible-thumping man who had built the ark for he and his two wives was on to something and amused us. The child speaking of his extricated wings, and his longing to belong, was touching (and we ignored that the zany Nick Nolte was taking care of him). In fact, we were compelled to root for Nolte in his seemingly genuine love for the child.
But you are asking too much to deal with so many loose ends and questions unanswered.
Yes, the film is beautiful and yes, it is unique; but is it really a complete film? I perceived it as an incomplete dreamscape that annoyed more than it satisfied and induced exhaustion more than it stimulated.
The film does, however, leave an unmistakable opium-like malaise which is appealing at certain levels...almost powerful enough to forget that it annoyed you before putting you to sleep!
Rating:  -
We are so fortunate that any filmmakers are taking genuine visionary risks today; trying to create unique moods and impressions. This is a wonderful film, slow paced and artful, dense and oblique, and filled with wonderful surprises and screwball humor. Quite a juggling act and not an obvious one--that's a tribute to the skills of the filmmakers. I was totally delighted when I saw this, I've watched it several times, it gets better with each viewing. Parts are exceptionally moving.
You'll notice similarities in the language used in most, if not all, of the negative reviews of this film. As a whole, they make for an illuminating read, an index of the Pandora's Box we've opened by allowing pop culture to be treated seriously ("Graphic Novels" instead of comic books, as if "Sandman" is the equivalent of "Don Quixote") and permitting kiddies to feel their strong yet ill-informed opinions about anything and everything were somehow highly valid.
"Boring" is the most frequently used word in these short stammering tantrum-like reviews (and in others like them elsewhere--read some Guy Maddin reviews sometime, it's depressing). "Artsy" is the other perjorative of choice (Today the word simply means "Over my head"). "Boring" is not an aesthetic judgement, it's a subjective impression and these days it's most frequently used by intellectually "youngish" people (unfortunately aged 14 to 50) who are equally "bored" by the "artsy" Beethoven or Shakespeare not to mention the ten million other major works of art that fail to titilate them in an ADD adaptive way. The Mona Lisa is boring, as are the Parthenon and Taj Mahal. Nowadays, one always senses a bag of weed, a bottle of beer, and an upcoming MBA hovering over that word; the fact that it may be an expensive imported beer and Ivy League frat-boy Colombian that cost more than most people's monthly food budget changes nothing. None of this would or should matter but the reason I'm making a big stink here is that marketing people, advertising geeks, the media, and politicians determine the texture of our entire culture by listening to kids of all ages weigh the universe in their boring/not boring scales. That's why our culture is almost complete candy-coated garbage nowadays, why childlike primary colors dominate in every sense, why the media is ignoring frontal lobes entirely, zeroing in on the back brain, the Reptilian part that deals solely with "Do I eat it, kill it, or have sex with it?"
I sense this film's severest and most incoherent critics therefore are the same twenty-something "yoots" who burbled and drooled delightedly over immortal classics like "Fight Club" and "Kill Bill." In other words, what I'm saying is that due to bad marketing (I saw this DVD for sale at Target at the mall for Pete's sake!) Northfork accidentally fell into the hands of a lot of toddlers. Normally, we genuinely serious adult weirdos and artists try very hard to prevent that sort of dreadful thing from happening: it's like letting a ten-year-old who's been eating ice cream handle Medieval manuscripts. Confronted with a complicated object that challenged them (rather than merely amuses them or validates a corporate-approved "bad-boy" lifestyle), they got all cwanky, dug out their cwayons, and wrote bad tings on the walls. If the Polish brothers had sensed the way the wind was blowing and included some, say, bondage sex or sex in a dumpster, hyper-violent fights of any type, obscenely large guns, hot chicks in stileto heels and skimpy outfits and other "freaky scenes" the negative reviews would never have materialized; instead there'd be contented cooing. I believe one of the future "Fangoria" magazine contributers or mass media tycoons described this film as a "crap-sandwich." This isn't criticism, this is letting the family dog rate restaurants.
I write this to help any individual here make a genuinely adult decision about trying this movie. If you're mature, intelligent, and sensible, and enjoy unique and imaginative film experiences you'll probably get something out of Northfork, in fact you'll probably be wowed by it. If you think yellow Hummers, violent Japanese cartoons, and "Sin City" are peak moments of Western Civilization do stay away and do keep your juvenile opinions about grown-up things you'll probably never understand to yourselves. For you guys the helpfulness "No" button is below just to the right, unfortunately there's no "Boring" option. Choosing "no" should indicate that the review was not helpful for you in making a decision about the film unless you're a politically correct, terrible-two drone and you get all itchy if a reviewer "flushes" Michael Moore's holy work down a toilet ("No! No! Make bad naughty Michael Moore review go 'way!). Or you can always register displeasure by simply throwing the remains of your Hot Pocket at the monitor screen--you were planning on upgrading to a flat screen anyway, weren't you?).
Rating: -
People looking for a night of mindless entertainment won't find it here. This is a thinking person's film, and one that people either love or hate. I first saw the movie with a group of six friends. Four of us thought it was one of the best films we'd ever seen, the other two thought it was a huge waste of time.
Northfork is best described as Touched By an Angel mixed with Fargo and a touch of Field of Dreams. It has a slow but compelling storyline that requires close attention in order to truly comprehend.
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