Main Cast: Woody Harrelson, Kristin Scott Thomas, Lauren Bacall, Lily Tomlin, Ned Beatty
Release Year: 2007
Country: UK/US
Run Time: 107 minutes
Plot
With The Walker, Paul Schrader unofficially updates themes and tropes first explored by his controversial erotic thriller American Gigolo (1980). Woody Harrelson stars as Carter Page III, an overtly gay, Virginia senator's son, paid as an asexual escort of middle-aged women in the upper-crust circles of Washington, D.C. Carter's regular clients include three politicos' wives: Natalie Van Miter (Lauren Bacall), Abigail Delorean (Lily Tomlin), and Lynn Lockner (Kristin Scott Thomas), to whom Carter is closest - so close that he squires her, regularly, to sexual rendezvous with her lover, the lobbyist Robbie Kononsberg (Steven Hartley). When an unknown perpetrator stabs Robbie to death, and Lynn discovers his murdered body at his condo, Carter attempts to protect Lynn and her husband, Larry (Willem Dafoe), from media intrusion by informing the police that he found the body himself, despite the fact that it makes him an immediate suspect. In time, Carter discovers from the women (during their gossip over a canasta game) that Robbie was involved with a shady insurance company, on the verge of being investigated - and that the investigation would have uncovered dirt and scandal on each woman. To shield Lynn from trouble, and deliver himself from incrimination, Page ultimately decides to investigate the crime himself, with the close assistance of his lover, the German-Turkish photographer Emek (Moritz Bleibtreu). Schrader authored the original script. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
Moritz Bleibtreu - Emek Yoglu; Willem Dafoe - Larry Lockner; William Hope - Mungo Tenant; Geff Francis - Detective Dixon; Steven Hartley - Robbie Kononsberg; Mary Beth Hurt - Chrissie Morgan
Credit
David Hindle - Art Director, Suzanne Crowley - Casting, Gilly Poole - Casting, Nic Ede - Costume Designer, Richard Styles - First Assistant Director, Paul Schrader - Director, Julian Rodd - Editor, Willi Baer - Executive Producer, Steve Christian - Executive Producer, Duncan Reid - Executive Producer, James Clayton - Executive Producer, Parseghian Planco - Executive Producer, Paul Sarony - Line Producer, Anne Dudley - Composer (Music Score), James Merifield - Production Designer, Chris Seager - Cinematographer, Deepak Nayar - Producer, John Hayes - Sound/Sound Designer, Paul Schrader - Screenwriter, David Insley - Second Unit Director Of Photography, Richard Lewis - Re-Recording Mixer, Simon Price - Supervising Sound Editor, Moving Picture Company - Visual Effects
The Walker is a 2007 drama film that was written and directed by Paul Schrader. It is a British-American independent production and was proclaimed to be the latest installment in Schrader's "night workers" series of films, starting with Taxi Driver in 1976, and then followed by American Gigolo in 1980 and Light Sleeper in 1992.
Carter Page III, a middle-aged gay man in Washington, D. C. is a "walker", a single man who escorts other mens' wives to social events so the husbands do not have to. One of the women he escorts, Lynn Lockner, is the wife of a United States senator and is carrying on an affair with a lobbyist. When she finds the lobbyist murdered, she embroils Carter in an investigation that leads to the highest levels of the federal government.
Schrader completed the script for The Walker in 2002. Initially the film was to be a direct sequel to American Gigolo, with Julian Kaye (played by Richard Gere) as the lead character. The director originally wanted Kevin Kline to play the lead.[1]
Critical reception
The film received positive reviews in its premiere run in the Berlin, Sydney, and Cambridge film festivals. The Walker was released direct-to-DVD because of poor ratings[clarification needed] but played in an independent film theater for two weeks in Dorris, California. The film received mixed reviews from critics. As of December 7, 2007, the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 51 percent of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 39 reviews.[2] On Metacritic, the film had an average score of 55 out of 100, based on seven reviews.[3]
