Themes: Obsessive Quests, Dropping Out, Fathers and Sons
Main Cast: Harrison Ford, Helen Mirren, River Phoenix, Jadrien Steele, Hilary Gordon
Release Year: 1986
Country: US
Run Time: 119 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG
Plot
Harrison Ford delivers one of his most-acclaimed performances in Peter Weir's adaptation of Paul Theroux's novel (scripted by Paul Schrader). Ford plays Allie Fox, an inventor embittered by the blighted landscape of the contemporary United States. As he tells his oldest son, Charlie (River Phoenix), "Look around you. It's a toilet." He moves his wife (Helen Mirren) and kids -- Charlie, Jerry (Jadrien Steele), April (Hilary Gordon), and Clover (Rebecca Gordon) -- to the rain forests of Central America, where he plans to create a new civilization starting with his own nuclear family. Allie's family compliantly goes along with his scheme to build a free society, but slowly notices that his obsession has turned him into a tyrannical fascist. Rather than create a utopia, Allie's driving egomania demands total subservience from his downtrodden brood. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
Review
An easy film to admire artistically but a difficult one to like, this intense character drama is one of the most challenging to audience expectations to ever emerge from star Harrison Ford or director Peter Weir. It should come as no surprise that it sprung from the pen of Paul Schrader, an artist adept at fashioning cinematic portraits of societal misfits. Ford is searing and powerfully memorable as Allie Fox, one of his best roles, an iconoclastic perfectionist who may very well be mentally ill, but who insists, in the style of many a creative genius before him, on doing everything in life on his own eccentric, tunnel-vision terms. Ford gets able support from Helen Mirren as his much-beleaguered wife and especially young River Phoenix as his son, whose sexual coming of age and one-time worship of his brilliant dad is thwarted by the realization that Allie's autocratic, self-centered vision of a utopian existence is not only foolhardy, but dangerous. There isn't much onscreen with which an audience might identify, so The Mosquito Coast faced an uphill and losing struggle at the box office, but its superior performances and potent political symbolism make it a worthy companion to other such "bungle in the jungle" films as Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972) and Apocalypse Now (1979). ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
Rebecca Gordon - Clover; Andre Gregory - Rev. Spellgood; Dick O'Neill - Mr. Polski; Martha Plimpton - Emily Spellgood; Melanie Boland - Mrs. Spellgood; Michael Rogers - Francis Lungly; Jason Alexander - Clerk; Raymond Clare - 1st Convert; Tiger Haynes - Mr. Semper; Butterfly McQueen - Ma Kennysick; William Newman - Capt. Smalls; Conrad Roberts - Mr. Haddy; Alice Sneed - Mrs. Polski; Abel Woolrich - Mercenary; Jorge Zepeda - Mercenary; Margaret Cho - Verny; Rafael Cho - Leon; Sofia Cho - Alice; Aurora Clavel - Mrs. Maywit; Emory King - Man at Bar; Juan Antonio Llanes - Mercenary; Michael Opolu - Bucky; Louis Palacio - Peaselee; Wilfred Peters - Dixon; Aldolpho Salguero - Drainy; Tony Vega Sr - Mr. Maywit; Dianne Crittenden
Credit
John Wingrove - Art Director, Gary Jones - Costume Designer, Peter Weir - Director, Richard Francis-Bruce - Editor, Thom Noble - Editor, Saul Zaentz - Executive Producer, Maurice Jarre - Composer (Music Score), Anthony Carter - Songwriter, John Stoddart - Production Designer, David Burr - Cinematographer, John Seale - Cinematographer, Jerome Hellman - Producer, Saul Zaentz - Producer, John Anderson - Set Designer, Lawrence James Cavanaugh - Special Effects, Paul Schrader - Screenwriter, Alan Splet - Supervising Sound Editor, Michael Dennison - Costumes Supervisor, Paul Theroux - Book Author
