X
- 1972
- R
- Warner Bros.
- 1 h 49 m
- 1972
- R
- Warner Bros.
- 1 h 49 m
Summary Intent on seeing the Cahulawassee River before it's turned into one huge lake, outdoor fanatic Lewis Medlock takes his friends on a river-rafting trip they'll never forget into the dangerous American back-country.
Directed By: John Boorman
Written By: James Dickey, John Boorman
- 1972
- R
- Warner Bros.
- 1 h 49 m
- 1972
- R
- Warner Bros.
- 1 h 49 m
Deliverance
80
7.7
Where to Watch
Summary Intent on seeing the Cahulawassee River before it's turned into one huge lake, outdoor fanatic Lewis Medlock takes his friends on a river-rafting trip they'll never forget into the dangerous American back-country.
Directed By: John Boorman
Written By: James Dickey, John Boorman
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 15 Critic Reviews
80
87% Positive
13 Reviews
13 Reviews
13% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 15 Critic Reviews
80
87% Positive
13 Reviews
13 Reviews
13% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Adapted from the novel by the poet James Dickey (who plays the small, significant role of a sheriff in the moral coda to the journey), it's a riveting, resonant film, the male rape sequence as shocking as it was 35 years ago. [28 Oct 2007, p.20]
Dickey taps into that stark mortal terror of abandoning control, where to become a wild man is somehow a form of connection.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 43 User Ratings
7.7
77% Positive
33 Ratings
33 Ratings
21% Mixed
9 Ratings
9 Ratings
2% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 43 User Ratings
7.7
77% Positive
33 Ratings
33 Ratings
21% Mixed
9 Ratings
9 Ratings
2% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
"Sometimes you have to lose yourself 'fore you can find anything."
-Lewis
"That a boy. I bet you can squeal. I bet you can squeal like a pig." -**** **** hillbilly. In this movie there's not a cellphone in sight, just people living in the moment!
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There's a quiet eeriness to Deliverance that you can feel right from the start because you know things aren't going to go well for these wannabe outdoorsmen. Everything in the movie feels real making things so much harsher as a result. The reason being a lot of this is real. The cast performed their own stunts which lead to things like a broken coccyx for Burt Reynolds and Jon Voight scaling a cliff with his bare hands. Their dedication was incredible and so are their performances.
You really witness a change in these characters when acts of nature and human cruelty strip away their undeserved confidence. Reynold's "Lewis" finds out that despite all that bravado he's not the survival man he thought he was, Ronny Cox stands firm in his morals in the face of desperate circumstances, Jon Voight finds taps into an inner strength to help save his friends, and Ned Beatry as the loudmouth of the group proves to be the most unbreakable after suffering the worst of the abuses. In the end all of them are delivered from their arrogant natures through trial by fire. This genuine growth is magnificent to watch unfold.
It's quite a harsh movie. Unflinching in it's depictions of the hardships inflicted on these characters. Including one very graphic ****. There is a beauty to go alongside the savagery though. The film almost seems to mourn the imminent loss of it's fictional river valley. It shows off the unforgiving side of wilderness, but in a way that's meant to make us respect it. The terror is balanced out with gorgeous scenery. The minimalistic use of music lets us hear every sound of the outdoors. We are made to know that the real enemy here isn't the river, but the people on it. Humans further perverting the world's organic, yet dangerous majesty with their barbaric presence.
This is a timeless movie. Dated visuals aside this almost feels like it hasn't aged a day. It's still just as harrowing and brutal as the day it was first released. This has withstood the test of time in a very impressive manner. A bona fide classic and likely the best work of Burt Reynold's career. On top of so much of the action being largely unstaged, you get the feeling that there's a message behind the violence. Making it more than just a pointless display of sadism.
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To this day, Dueling Banjoes still gives me the willies.
With his Mephisto-phelean swagger and chewy, good ol’ boy drawl, Reynolds is a chest-beating revelation.
Jon Voight, Burt Reynolds and, indeed, all the members of the cast are finely tuned and very good. What the movie totally fails at, however, is its attempt to make some kind of significant statement about its action.
In the depiction of sudden, violent death, there is the rhapsodic wallowing in the deadly beauty of it all: protruding arrows, agonizing expiration, etc. It’s the stuff of which slapdash oaters and crime programmers are made but the obvious ambitions of Deliverance are supposed to be on a higher plane.
free from any law..
Deliverance
3 Out Of 5
Deliverance is a tale of three friends seeking for an adventurous time and ends up getting a higher punch of it. The genre demands smarter approach since there have been plenty of features like such, and fortunately it is delivered with confidence in here where the obvious isn't fed to the audience but instead is kept in a subtle tone that increases the curiosity and makes them root for it. It is short on technical aspects like sound department, background score and art design although is edited perfectly. The script is well structured and follows a rudimentary process but the elaborated plan of the writer makes it all worth. James ****; the screenwriter, who wrote the original novel too, is well aware of the characteristics of the characters and uses it wisely on keeping the audience engaged throughout the course of it. And John Boorman; the director, has done a tremendous work on executing this tensed tale and has offered the palpable yet essential eerie tone to the feature. The performance is decent in here; nothing out of the park nor to be question upon, by the protagonist Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds in his supportive role. Deliverance is free from any law or terms and is surely ahead of its time, and the credit goes to the director who had the guts to pull off such concept.
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This is a canoeing adventure that goes very wrong. There is not much in the way of blood and guts so the interest and fear comes from the situation that the adventurers found themselves in. It is scary to think that it would be possible for this sort of thing to happen and that you may be stuck up the creek injured and without a hope. It is worth watching as a late night thinking thriller. Not too memorable unlike the similar concept of Straw Dogs (1971) which is far better and much more memorable. Still a fraught and stressful experience that has the legendary banjo scene!
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I found the book way too long and way too boring but I was hoping having it condensed down into a movie's length would really improve it. I was right, this is definitely better than the **** it still feels overly long and pointlessly so. Some scenes just linger and include the most unnecessary and downright boring shots. That being said props to director John Boorman for doing what was probably ahead of its time in 1972, and executing it as well as he did. Solid performances all round from the cast too (who did all their own stunts including the rafting and cliff scaling!). That banjo scene is also fire.
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