Amazon.co.uk Review
After they first worked together on the 1966 film This Property Is Condemned, director Sydney Pollack and Robert Redford continued their long-lasting collaboration with this 1972 drama set during the mid-1800s, about one man's rugged effort to shed the burden of civilisation and learn to survive in the wilderness of the Rocky Mountains. Will Geer is perfectly cast as the seasoned trapper who teaches Jeremiah Johnson (Redford) how to survive against harsh winters, close encounters with grizzly bears, and hostile Crow Indians. In the course of his adventure, Johnson marries the daughter of a Flathead Indian chief, forms a makeshift family, and ultimately assumes a mythic place in Rocky Mountain folklore. Shot entirely on location in Utah, Jeremiah Johnson boasts an abundance of breathtaking widescreen scenery, and the story (despite a PG rating) doesn't flinch from the brutality of the wilderness. --Jeff Shannon
Customer Reviews:
The only Robert Redford performance I can stand..........2007-10-12
I am not a big fan of Robert Redford, but have no problem at all rating this marvel five stars.
In my humble opinion the best film he ever starred in, and with an encomiable subdued acting.
The history of the mountain man who goes at war with the crows is as epic as anything HOMER wrote and adquires the quality of greek tragedy.
Pollack does a great job directing and the result is a brilliant film.
If you enjoyed DANCES WITH WOLVES... this is for you.
ADB
"The day that you tarry is the day that you lose ...".......2004-07-06
He was a big man, maybe even growing in physical stature with the growth of his myth; deadly with his Bowie knife and his gun alike. He'd been a fighter in the U.S.-Mexican war, but left the lowland's ways behind in favor of a mountain man's: the lonesome hunt, the wild outdoors, and the confrontation with nature rather than his fellow men. And he came to be known as "Crow Killer" and "Liver Eating Johns(t)on" when he took war to the Crow nation after they killed his wife.
Based on Raymond Thorp/Robert Bunker's "Crow Killer" and Vardis Fisher's "Mountain Man" and scripted by John Milius and Edward Anhalt - with input from frequent Redford/Pollack cooperator David Rayfiel - Sydney Pollack's and Robert Redford's 1972 movie loosely traces the mythical hunter's legend, opening with his arrival at the fort where he buys his first horse and gun. "Ride due west as the sun sets. Turn left at the Rocky Mountains," is a trader's goodnatured answer to Johnson's naive inquiry where to find "bear, beaver and other critters worth cash money when skinned." But soon he finds that his lowland skills no longer do him any good, almost starving in the freezing mountainous winter before being taken in by old "griz" hunter Bear Claw Chris Lapp (Will Geer in a stand-out role - his and Redford's deadpan exchanges alone make this movie worth its price).
Setting out on his own again the following year Johnson fares better, even gaining the respect of a Crow warrior prosaically named Paints His Shirt Red (Joaquin Martinez), the first person he encountered in the mountains. After assisting a settler's wife who had to watch her family massacred by Indians (Allyn Ann McLerie) and reluctantly agreeing to take charge of her son (Josh Albee) - a boy grown mute by the horrors he witnessed, whom he names Caleb - he comes across white hunter Del Gue (Stefan Gierasch), buried up to his head in sand by a band of Blackfeet. Revenging that act unwittingly leaves Johnson with a wife, in exchange for bestowing the Blackfeet's ponies and guns on Flathead chief Two-Tongues-Lebeaux (Richard Angarola): the chief's daughter Swan (Delle Bolton). Although neither embraces the match enthusiastically, over time Jeremiah and Swan learn to appreciate and, eventually, love each other. But then fate strikes: Against better judgment pressured into guiding a cavalry company through Crow burial ground, Johnson finds Swan and Caleb murdered upon his return. He sets out after the Crow who invaded his home ... and plants the seeds of his myth.
"Jeremiah Johnson" was Redford's and Pollack's second of seven collaborations after 1966's "This Property is Condemned." What most obviously characterizes this movie is the breathtaking manner in which its cinematography uses Utah's mountains (doubling for the story's actual Montana setting): despite studio budgetary limits shot entirely on location, the film had Redford acting as a virtual tour guide to the magnificent Wasatch, which he had recently made his home himself.
But the movie also shows enormous restraint, particularly given its violent underlying story. There's no blood-gushing "Braveheart"-style, no dramatic score; fights are mostly one-on-one, occurring as they would in real life - silently, with only the opponents' grunts being heard - and despite his fearsome epithet we never actually see Johnson eat a dead Crow warrior's liver. (Reportedly a script change on which Redford insisted: wisely so.) Similarly, Johnson's and Swan's relationship builds on small symbolic gestures, moving from his coarse attempts to teach her English and refusal to learn her language to conversations in Salish (Flathead); and from her submissive expectation of his exercising his marital rights on their wedding night (which rather repulses him) to later-exchanged tender glances and smiles: Thus, we only learn about their marriage's belated consummation when one morning Swan points to his beard in response to his question about her reddish cheeks. - Further, there's no dramatic conclusion; no final battle: as Johnson's myth begins to grow and he withdraws deeper and deeper into the mountains, he retraces his steps and meets in reverse order the people he encountered after his arrival: Del Gue, the settler now living in Caleb's mother's cabin, Bear Claw Chris Lapp; and finally Paints His Shirt Red who, although a Crow, created a monument in Johnson's honor and sends him off with a last salute, which Johnson reciprocates; ending the movie in an immortalizing freeze-frame shot - again, a feature insisted on by Redford, doubtlessly reminiscent of "Butch and Sundance" (and repeated one way or another in several subsequent movies).
Despite its languid pace and although just under two hours long, "Jeremiah Johnson" formally takes an epic approach, complete with overture, entr'acte and narrator (uncredited, but I think Willie Nelson), whose subtle voiceovers and brief songs provide key narrative bridges. While the latter match the movie's overall style and the overture at least corresponds with Johnson's mythical stature - albeit also setting up ultimately unfulfilled expectations of a dramatic finale - adding an entr'acte may have been a bit much, particularly in the middle of the ride through the Crow burial ground (incidentally a screenplay addition designed to give the Indians a reason to punish Johnson and not make them appear as mindless killers). In my view this breaks the dramatic tension rather than enhancing it; problematic insofar as virtually all that remains thereafter is Johnson's gradual withdrawal into the mountains and fights with the Crow. But no matter. This is a terrific movie, featuring great banter with Johnson's fellow hunters as well as some wonderfully delicate scenes with Swan, showcasing some of North America's most dramatically beautiful scenery, and growing on you more and more the more often you watch it.
And some say he's up there still ...
"The way that you wander is the way that you choose. The day that you tarry is the day that you lose. Sunshine or thunder, a man will always wonder where the fair wind blows ..."
(Lyrics, Jeremiah Johnson's theme.)
Don't shortcut through cemeteries.......2004-02-07
Way back (1972) when a much younger Robert Redford worked more in front of the camera than behind it, he starred as JEREMIAH JOHNSON, a man disgusted with mid-1800's U.S. "civilization", who decides to drop out, and then tune-in to a purer life as a fur trapper in the Rocky Mountains.
Initially, Johnson epitomizes the term "tenderfoot", and would have starved on the job had he not been taken under the wing of a grizzled, experienced mountain man, Bear Claw, marvelously played by Will Geer. With new skills learned from his mentor, Jeremiah strikes out on his own. Along the way, he becomes encumbered with a "family" - a small white boy essentially orphaned by an Indian raid, and a native wife more or less forced on him by her brother, a friendly Flathead Indian chief. In time, he learns to love them both - an emotional investment for which he pays dearly after a band of Crow Indians retaliates for a major social faux pas that Johnson commits while helping an Army cavalry detachment rescue a party of snow-bound pioneers. From that point, revenge takes over on a tit for tat basis. The conclusion is perhaps a lesson for present-day enemies of long standing on how to end for both sides what is otherwise a no-win situation.
Filmed on location in the Rockies, JEREMIAH JOHNSON is a scenic and powerful contribution to the Western genre of filmmaking. It does particularly well in depicting the lonely solitude lived by the American mountain man of yore. Redford's portrayal of a regular guy just trying to get along and survive is beyond reproach. As a matter of fact, I think it's one of the better roles he's played in his career. Nowadays, when Westerns aren't as much in vogue as they used to be, perhaps the film is worth another look. Oh, and be circumspect when it comes to sauntering through graveyards.
As magnificent as its scenery!.......2001-12-20
The motion picture "Jeremiah Johnson" is one of those films you don't soon forget. While clearly not as timeless as Ford's "The Searchers" or as groundbreaking as any of Leone's "Spaghetti Westerns", "Jeremiah Johnson" has a human quality that most westerns lack. The film details the story of a man trying to come-to-grips with the two worlds he seems destined to be tested by; the world of man and the world of nature. From beginning to end, one sees the trials and triumphs of this man as learns to survive and learns to live with the dichotomy of his existance. While there are certain glaring errors in the film, a radio tower can be seen in the background of one scene, the film has a pace and a feel that appeals to the individual seeking a "different kind of western." With a haunting soundtrack and some of the most beautiful scenery ever put on film, "Jeremiah Johnson" is a great, if not excellent, Western.
Old style Epic.......2000-11-23
I watched this movie again having last watched it some 18 yrs ago as a kid, and wondered how it would stand the test of time? Well I was not disappointed, beautiful photography, solid performances a simple story with few words and dialogue, and the result is truly evocative movie, albeit idealising the a way of life in the 'Old West'. Redford gives a good performance,(as I've said one of little words... which feels right) and there is lovely supporting roles for Will Greer (yes of Waltons fame) as the wily old trapper teaching the ' pilgrim' Redford the ways of the Mountain men, after he escapes the rigours of 1800's 'civilization' for the purer simpler existence in the wilderness. There's a great little cameo performance in the guise of the character ' Del Gru' who we see as the bald headed trapper (to discourage the indians scalping him) who crosses paths with Redford on a couple of occasions. In many ways they don't make westerns like this anymore, and this film has a resonance and simple power which stays with you long after the credits have rolled. I'd say buy this one
Amazon.co.uk Review
After they first worked together on the 1966 film This Property Is Condemned, director Sydney Pollack and Robert Redford continued their long-lasting collaboration with this 1972 drama set during the mid-1800s, about one man's rugged effort to shed the burden of civilisation and learn to survive in the wilderness of the Rocky Mountains. Will Geer is perfectly cast as the seasoned trapper who teaches Jeremiah Johnson (Redford) how to survive against harsh winters, close encounters with grizzly bears, and hostile Crow Indians. In the course of his adventure, Johnson marries the daughter of a Flathead Indian chief, forms a makeshift family, and ultimately assumes a mythic place in Rocky Mountain folklore. Shot entirely on location in Utah, Jeremiah Johnson boasts an abundance of breathtaking widescreen scenery, and the story (despite a PG rating) doesn't flinch from the brutality of the wilderness. --Jeff Shannon
Customer Reviews:
The only Robert Redford performance I can stand..........2007-10-12
I am not a big fan of Robert Redford, but have no problem at all rating this marvel five stars.
In my humble opinion the best film he ever starred in, and with an encomiable subdued acting.
The history of the mountain man who goes at war with the crows is as epic as anything HOMER wrote and adquires the quality of greek tragedy.
Pollack does a great job directing and the result is a brilliant film.
If you enjoyed DANCES WITH WOLVES... this is for you.
ADB
"The day that you tarry is the day that you lose ...".......2004-07-06
He was a big man, maybe even growing in physical stature with the growth of his myth; deadly with his Bowie knife and his gun alike. He'd been a fighter in the U.S.-Mexican war, but left the lowland's ways behind in favor of a mountain man's: the lonesome hunt, the wild outdoors, and the confrontation with nature rather than his fellow men. And he came to be known as "Crow Killer" and "Liver Eating Johns(t)on" when he took war to the Crow nation after they killed his wife.
Based on Raymond Thorp/Robert Bunker's "Crow Killer" and Vardis Fisher's "Mountain Man" and scripted by John Milius and Edward Anhalt - with input from frequent Redford/Pollack cooperator David Rayfiel - Sydney Pollack's and Robert Redford's 1972 movie loosely traces the mythical hunter's legend, opening with his arrival at the fort where he buys his first horse and gun. "Ride due west as the sun sets. Turn left at the Rocky Mountains," is a trader's goodnatured answer to Johnson's naive inquiry where to find "bear, beaver and other critters worth cash money when skinned." But soon he finds that his lowland skills no longer do him any good, almost starving in the freezing mountainous winter before being taken in by old "griz" hunter Bear Claw Chris Lapp (Will Geer in a stand-out role - his and Redford's deadpan exchanges alone make this movie worth its price).
Setting out on his own again the following year Johnson fares better, even gaining the respect of a Crow warrior prosaically named Paints His Shirt Red (Joaquin Martinez), the first person he encountered in the mountains. After assisting a settler's wife who had to watch her family massacred by Indians (Allyn Ann McLerie) and reluctantly agreeing to take charge of her son (Josh Albee) - a boy grown mute by the horrors he witnessed, whom he names Caleb - he comes across white hunter Del Gue (Stefan Gierasch), buried up to his head in sand by a band of Blackfeet. Revenging that act unwittingly leaves Johnson with a wife, in exchange for bestowing the Blackfeet's ponies and guns on Flathead chief Two-Tongues-Lebeaux (Richard Angarola): the chief's daughter Swan (Delle Bolton). Although neither embraces the match enthusiastically, over time Jeremiah and Swan learn to appreciate and, eventually, love each other. But then fate strikes: Against better judgment pressured into guiding a cavalry company through Crow burial ground, Johnson finds Swan and Caleb murdered upon his return. He sets out after the Crow who invaded his home ... and plants the seeds of his myth.
"Jeremiah Johnson" was Redford's and Pollack's second of seven collaborations after 1966's "This Property is Condemned." What most obviously characterizes this movie is the breathtaking manner in which its cinematography uses Utah's mountains (doubling for the story's actual Montana setting): despite studio budgetary limits shot entirely on location, the film had Redford acting as a virtual tour guide to the magnificent Wasatch, which he had recently made his home himself.
But the movie also shows enormous restraint, particularly given its violent underlying story. There's no blood-gushing "Braveheart"-style, no dramatic score; fights are mostly one-on-one, occurring as they would in real life - silently, with only the opponents' grunts being heard - and despite his fearsome epithet we never actually see Johnson eat a dead Crow warrior's liver. (Reportedly a script change on which Redford insisted: wisely so.) Similarly, Johnson's and Swan's relationship builds on small symbolic gestures, moving from his coarse attempts to teach her English and refusal to learn her language to conversations in Salish (Flathead); and from her submissive expectation of his exercising his marital rights on their wedding night (which rather repulses him) to later-exchanged tender glances and smiles: Thus, we only learn about their marriage's belated consummation when one morning Swan points to his beard in response to his question about her reddish cheeks. - Further, there's no dramatic conclusion; no final battle: as Johnson's myth begins to grow and he withdraws deeper and deeper into the mountains, he retraces his steps and meets in reverse order the people he encountered after his arrival: Del Gue, the settler now living in Caleb's mother's cabin, Bear Claw Chris Lapp; and finally Paints His Shirt Red who, although a Crow, created a monument in Johnson's honor and sends him off with a last salute, which Johnson reciprocates; ending the movie in an immortalizing freeze-frame shot - again, a feature insisted on by Redford, doubtlessly reminiscent of "Butch and Sundance" (and repeated one way or another in several subsequent movies).
Despite its languid pace and although just under two hours long, "Jeremiah Johnson" formally takes an epic approach, complete with overture, entr'acte and narrator (uncredited, but I think Willie Nelson), whose subtle voiceovers and brief songs provide key narrative bridges. While the latter match the movie's overall style and the overture at least corresponds with Johnson's mythical stature - albeit also setting up ultimately unfulfilled expectations of a dramatic finale - adding an entr'acte may have been a bit much, particularly in the middle of the ride through the Crow burial ground (incidentally a screenplay addition designed to give the Indians a reason to punish Johnson and not make them appear as mindless killers). In my view this breaks the dramatic tension rather than enhancing it; problematic insofar as virtually all that remains thereafter is Johnson's gradual withdrawal into the mountains and fights with the Crow. But no matter. This is a terrific movie, featuring great banter with Johnson's fellow hunters as well as some wonderfully delicate scenes with Swan, showcasing some of North America's most dramatically beautiful scenery, and growing on you more and more the more often you watch it.
And some say he's up there still ...
"The way that you wander is the way that you choose. The day that you tarry is the day that you lose. Sunshine or thunder, a man will always wonder where the fair wind blows ..."
(Lyrics, Jeremiah Johnson's theme.)
Don't shortcut through cemeteries.......2004-02-07
Way back (1972) when a much younger Robert Redford worked more in front of the camera than behind it, he starred as JEREMIAH JOHNSON, a man disgusted with mid-1800's U.S. "civilization", who decides to drop out, and then tune-in to a purer life as a fur trapper in the Rocky Mountains.
Initially, Johnson epitomizes the term "tenderfoot", and would have starved on the job had he not been taken under the wing of a grizzled, experienced mountain man, Bear Claw, marvelously played by Will Geer. With new skills learned from his mentor, Jeremiah strikes out on his own. Along the way, he becomes encumbered with a "family" - a small white boy essentially orphaned by an Indian raid, and a native wife more or less forced on him by her brother, a friendly Flathead Indian chief. In time, he learns to love them both - an emotional investment for which he pays dearly after a band of Crow Indians retaliates for a major social faux pas that Johnson commits while helping an Army cavalry detachment rescue a party of snow-bound pioneers. From that point, revenge takes over on a tit for tat basis. The conclusion is perhaps a lesson for present-day enemies of long standing on how to end for both sides what is otherwise a no-win situation.
Filmed on location in the Rockies, JEREMIAH JOHNSON is a scenic and powerful contribution to the Western genre of filmmaking. It does particularly well in depicting the lonely solitude lived by the American mountain man of yore. Redford's portrayal of a regular guy just trying to get along and survive is beyond reproach. As a matter of fact, I think it's one of the better roles he's played in his career. Nowadays, when Westerns aren't as much in vogue as they used to be, perhaps the film is worth another look. Oh, and be circumspect when it comes to sauntering through graveyards.
As magnificent as its scenery!.......2001-12-20
The motion picture "Jeremiah Johnson" is one of those films you don't soon forget. While clearly not as timeless as Ford's "The Searchers" or as groundbreaking as any of Leone's "Spaghetti Westerns", "Jeremiah Johnson" has a human quality that most westerns lack. The film details the story of a man trying to come-to-grips with the two worlds he seems destined to be tested by; the world of man and the world of nature. From beginning to end, one sees the trials and triumphs of this man as learns to survive and learns to live with the dichotomy of his existance. While there are certain glaring errors in the film, a radio tower can be seen in the background of one scene, the film has a pace and a feel that appeals to the individual seeking a "different kind of western." With a haunting soundtrack and some of the most beautiful scenery ever put on film, "Jeremiah Johnson" is a great, if not excellent, Western.
Old style Epic.......2000-11-23
I watched this movie again having last watched it some 18 yrs ago as a kid, and wondered how it would stand the test of time? Well I was not disappointed, beautiful photography, solid performances a simple story with few words and dialogue, and the result is truly evocative movie, albeit idealising the a way of life in the 'Old West'. Redford gives a good performance,(as I've said one of little words... which feels right) and there is lovely supporting roles for Will Greer (yes of Waltons fame) as the wily old trapper teaching the ' pilgrim' Redford the ways of the Mountain men, after he escapes the rigours of 1800's 'civilization' for the purer simpler existence in the wilderness. There's a great little cameo performance in the guise of the character ' Del Gru' who we see as the bald headed trapper (to discourage the indians scalping him) who crosses paths with Redford on a couple of occasions. In many ways they don't make westerns like this anymore, and this film has a resonance and simple power which stays with you long after the credits have rolled. I'd say buy this one
DVD:
- Jumanji Special Edition [1995]
- Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove Collection
- Locked Up [2004]
- Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels: Directors Cut [1998]
- Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels (Special Edition) [1998]
- Lock Up [1990]
- Lord of the Rings : Return of the King - Special Limited Edition [2004]
- Mad Max Trilogy: Mad Max, Mad Max 2 and Mad Max Beyond the Thunderdome [1979]
- Men In Black I and II Box Set [1997]
- Minotaur
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