Borserie it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

Tayloriona Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

Rexanne It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

AaronCapenBanner Curtis Hanson directed this exciting thriller that stars Meryl Streep and David Strathairn as Gail and Tom Hartman, who are taking their son with them on a white water river rafting trip in the mountains while on vacation. Gail is the real expert rafter, which will come in handy as they are intercepted by two men named Wade and Terry(played by Kevin Bacon and John C. Reilly) who at first pretend to simply be lost and inexperienced rafters. Wade even bonds with their son to an extent, and appears charming to Gail, but they are both really crooks who kidnap them at gunpoint and force Gail to lead them over the rapids, where they will meet up with their accomplices. How can Gail get them out of this mess? Good film with solid direction and performances, especially Streep and Bacon. May not be entirely original, even routine, but so skillfully presented it doesn't matter.

david-sarkies The River Wild is classed as an action movie but I would say that it has aspects of horror in it as well. I would not say that it is a pure horror movie, especially since people expect horror to have nasty creatures in it, but there are elements of it there. This movie is about a family who decide to take their son, Rouke, on a rafting holiday down a river. The wife (Meryl Streep) is an expert rafter and rower and she used to be a ranger in the park where they are rafting, but now she has moved to the city where she rows in much calmer waters. At the same time, three men are also rafting down the river, but their guide supposedly leaves after a fight and they must join up. The family soon begin to distrust the two men and it soon turns out they they are armed robbers and very violent ones at that. They want to go down river so that they might escape the police and live on the spoils of their heist.The horror of this movie comes out with the dominance that these men have over the family. They are in the stituation where they have absolutely no choice but to follow the orders of these men. Everything that they try to do fails because these men are both armed and physically stronger than the others. The husband is an architect who is on his first rafting adventure, and the wife, though she is quite fit physically, is incapable of fighting the men. Thus they must bow to these men's every demand or face the consequences.In true Hollywood fashion, they defeat the bad guys and none of the good guys die. The dog escapes and the husband, who flees in the night, narrowly misses being shot. In the end this movie is thin on theme and plot. The men are suspicious right from the start as they look rough and are very impatient. They begin friendly but behave in a way the is quite unfriendly. This is a horror because we, living in a world where we believe in our freedom, do not want it taken away from us, and in this situation the men have done that. They live by no law and serve nobody. They are unpredictable and dangerous. Still, I was not scared and found the movie reasonable. The journey through the Gauntlet at the end of the movie is the best part and it is worth seeing for that only.

FlashCallahan Gail is a professional at water rafting.She twigs every day, and she is in a very good shape. She takes her family, one day, to a rafting trip down the river, but she has no idea that the planned trip is about to become a nightmare.Two escaping robbers with a handgun, meet the family in the way, and join them to the trip.Only later Gail realises that their new friends are dangerous criminals, but it's too late.The two men force them to stay together, and to keep cruising down the river.The family's life are risked not only by the two men, but also by the river which becomes more stormy and wilder....Thefirst thing that you notice about this movie is that it's the first time since 'Aliens' that a woman has taken the lead in a Hollywood action movie. Streep is an odd choice, but as the heroine, she really brings a vulnerability to her character which makes her wholly believable.The story isn't up to much, but thanks to such good direction and brilliant rapid sequences, this becomes more than an average thriller.Bacon is as sinister as needed, but he too has his vulnerable side. Sub plots involving marriage break ups and Benjamin Bratt are an added bonus, and Joseph Mazello proves he wasn't a one trick pony in Jurassic park, he's just as annoying in this.It's a shame it's not a well remembered movie, because it is a thrilling movie with some wonderful performances.

sddavis63 I'll grant that the last 15 minutes or so of "The River Wild" are a pretty exciting and suspenseful white water rafting adventure. The unfortunate thing about it is that these are only the last 15 minutes or so. Up to that point what we have is a pretty slow moving river journey, with the added complication, of course, being that the troubled family on the trip finds more trouble as they pick up a couple of guys who robbed the local cattle auction. In the end the movie turns out to be pretty formulaic, with movements and plot points that we've definitely seen before - many times, in fact.Meryl Streep was an interesting choice as Gail - mother and white water guide - and while she was interesting (basically because this isn't what you'd think of as a normal Meryl Streep role) I didn't find her convincing in the part, either (which is probably why it's not a normal Meryl Streep role!) Kevin Bacon was somewhat more credible as Wade, the guy apparently in charge of the robbery, who decides to take the family hostage in order to use Gail's rafting expertise to run a particularly deadly river in the hopes of escaping the law. Along for the ride were David Strathairn as Gail's husband, John C. Reilly as Wade's sidekick and Joseph Mazzello as young Roarke, Gail's son.It's a decent enough cast. The story isn't especially original, though, and I just didn't find the movie to be all that exciting. Watching a rafting trip (which is essentially what we do for the bulk of this movie) with a few bits of drama thrown in as we become gradually more suspicious of the two strangers doesn't exactly make for a gripping two hours of viewing. There is, of course, the requisite ending as it seems that all the family's troubles are solved by having gone through this adventure together. (3/10)