Watch Down in the Valley For Free

Stylish but barely mediocre overall

Just perfect...

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

When you watch the full movie (I know you wouldn't) you'll suffer from anger and anxiety, because after the first half the things won't go in your way. And during the second half, most probably you'll quit watching the movie or you'll break the screen. I think the director was confused himself, like he started a good story and in the middle he was confused how to end it. So the best way he could find was to let the hero die with the bullet of his girlfriend's father. And the good reason that was given to the father to kill his daughter's boyfriend at the end was the fact that the boyfriend accidentally shot his girlfriend, so the father has to seek revenge or something like that. I don't know what the director wanted to tell the people about Harlan. Was he trying to tell that Harlan was a psychopath or was he trying to tell that Harlan was an ambitious & able guy who made a big mistake and didn't want to or wasn't able to accept it. The director couldn't made that clear. Because he has shown a sudden unpredictable behavior of Harlan, so i considered him a psychopath in the second half of the movie.Although the first half of the movie was really interesting and worth watching. The way that Harlan fell in love with Tobe was fabulous. And later how Harlan tries to convince Tobe's father about his personality and how his fate picturizes him in front of Tobe's father was really an interesting stuff to watch. But later the director wasn't able to handle the story. All the good taste developed in the first half was vanished in the second half.Another confusing thing was that the girl 'Tobe' didn't want to go with her boyfriend when he asks him to leave his father. It's not the thing the she didn't trust him or she was afraid of him. It's not like that because the Director David Jacobson showed a huge amount of passion in their relationship in the first half. And then the sudden unpredictable and stupid act of Harlan made me out of my mind, what i mean is that no matter what happens nobody can shoot the one whom he loves. What kind of heart he has got. These kind of issues in the movie are not explained in a good fashion leaving tangling questions in people's minds.And at last at the ending quarter of the movie, Harlan wasn't ready to accept his mistake so he took a kid (Tobe's step brother) with him. What's the point in that? Such a stupid ending. I would say if David Jacobson had thought about the story in a fresh air and calm environment he would do a lot better.

By chance, a lonely, simpleton cowpoke named Harlan (Edward Norton) pops into the life of a California valley girl named Tobe (Evan Rachel Wood). The two hit it off. She's taken by Harlan's polite, simpleminded charm. He wears a cowboy hat, talks ranches and horses, and can twirl a gun like nobody's business. Tobe and her kid brother idolize Harlan. But Tobe's dad Wade (David Morse) is suspicious of Harlan from the get-go.The plot details the relationship between Tobe and Harlan, as it becomes ever shakier, en route to a poignant ending. The first half is slow, with a focus on character development. The second half is more interesting, but is less believable. The script is evasive about Harlan's background. And I just could not take him seriously. Nor could I take seriously Tobe's love for him. The entire story did not seem plausible.Acting is quite good. Despite an annoying voice, Edward Norton does a fine job of portraying Harlan. Evan Rachel Wood was more than convincing in her role. Maybe it was the character of Wade I didn't like, but I found David Morse irritating as a rarely smiling, unsympathetic dad."Down In The Valley" is the story of an urban drifter who, through his own fantasies and self-image, impacts the lives of a typical urban family. I found the film uncomfortable to sit through, because Harlan did not seem real. I guess the film's theme is that he and his fantasies symbolize what's left of the Old West, a fantasy sociologically discordant with modern life.

Edward Norton is superior in portraying young, edgy characters, and he has scored another home run in this film. He plays Harlan who is enamored of cowboys and the code of the Old West. Harlan is definitely out of place in contemporary metropolitan Los Angeles.Tobe - a nickname for October - is the typical lower-middle-class Valley Girl who disagrees with her father about, basically, everything. She expresses her disagreement with her foul mouth and numerous little acts of defiance. Evan Rachel Wood creates a character in Tobe with whom the viewer has great sympathy because she is really a good-hearted teenager looking for her identity. Her scenes with her younger brother are especially touching.Rory Culkin plays the younger brother, Lonnie, who is beset by almost crippling insecurity due to an emotionally distant father and the fact that he is very small for his thirteen years.There is no mention of a mother, but the father is skillfully played by David Morse as a man who cares for the welfare of both of his children but has absolutely no clue as to how to deal with the tender egos of two adolescents. It's as though he has never read a book or seen a television show about the problems of children in today's world. He simply blunders stupidly forward making one wrong martinet-like decision after the other.The plot of the film - in the first two-thirds, at least - is basically pat. A teenager meets a charming young man from the West who is displaced in Los Angeles. He is full of dreams and shares those with the girl - and importantly - with her emotionally scarred younger brother. The father is very suspicious of the relationship.The last third of the film severely weakens a very good start in that it resolves all of these conflicts with some totally unbelievable actions on the part of all the characters. Because some of the events are so surreal, the viewer might come to suspect that some are taking place only in the minds of the participants, but there is no indication that this is so.Down in the Valley is flawed by overdone climatic scenes, but the general feel of the film is entertaining and worthwhile. Edward Norton is a bit long in the tooth for the character he portrays, but his acting is so superior that you forgive this flaw. This is a good movie with an insightful interview of Norton and Jacobson on the DVD - worthwhile entertainment.

What starts out as a gentle country yarn, inoffensive and mildly enjoyable romantic tale changes pace as Edward Norton's initially charming Harlan gradually reveals more about himself and things take a turn for the sinister, as the film gradually changes from a southern romance to a modern wild western.An amiable rancher (Norton) wanders into town and charms a young girl (Evan Rachel Wood), seemingly rescuing her from a dead-end existence with her bad-tempered father with a whirlwind romance, but it gradually becomes apparent that there is more to this cowboy than meets the eye.Edward Norton – a real chameleon actor (with changing facial hair to match) playing a country hick, accent slightly dodgy but maybe because he's merely trying to act the part without worrying about the accent. He certainly makes it appear effortless to make all the nuanced little adjustments as we learn more about Harlan. However, with too many small changes it means we are never sure exactly where Harlan is coming from, and what seemed like a good performance from Norton gradually becomes confused. Evan Rachel Wood is likable without ever really having a great deal to do other than bat her eyelids at Norton.Down in the Valley strikes as a slightly uneven tale due to its change of pace, and by never really making the protagonist's motives clear the audience's sympathies for the characters remain uncertain. Should we like this drifter or not? Even after a dramatic turn of events it remains unclear. This ambiguity is to the film's detriment, as if the writer could not make up their mind what kind of story they wanted to tell and settled for somewhat of a hotch-potch. Had the film remained one or the other it might have been a solid film, but as it is what we are left with is something of a mess. Fans of old-fashioned romance will enjoy a portion of the film but will be put off by the darkening tone. Completist fans of Norton aside (or fans of the lush scenery of the San Fernando valley), give this a miss.