First Cow

A Film by Kelly Reichardt. In English with German subtitles.

[Credits] [Trailer]

The waters of a river flow pla­cid­ly by. On its banks, time rewinds, brin­ging buried sto­ries to light. At the begin­ning of the 19th cen­tu­ry, fur trap­pers are not the only ones to ven­ture into the wilds of Oregon; there’s also a taci­turn cook, a loner who finds an able entre­pre­neur and fri­end in a Chinese immi­grant. The two start a small trade in “oily cakes”, which turns out to be a gre­at suc­cess in the rough West. The only catch: the raw mate­ri­al they use is acqui­red ille­gal­ly. Director Kelly Reichardt co-wro­te the screen­play with Jonathan Raymond, aut­hor of the novel upon which the film is based. First Cow con­firms her talent for tel­ling sto­ries of an America fil­led with pro­mi­se, far from the big cities. Like a Western, the film pays tri­bu­te to cha­rac­ters on the mar­gins of socie­ty who must take desti­ny into their own hands – only here, ins­tead of guns, there’s a spoon­ful of honey and a pail of milk. Thus, the­se out­laws pre­sent the fron­tier, that screen onto which America pro­jects its natio­nal dreams, not as a place of eco­no­mic or mate­ri­al con­quest, but as a mee­ting place. A sple­ndid alter­na­ti­ve sce­na­rio, which today acqui­res par­ti­cu­lar civil and poli­ti­cal significance.

Credits:

US 2019, 122 Min., engl. OmU
Regie: Kelly Reichardt
Kamera: Christopher Blauvelt
mit: John Magaro, Orion Lee, Toby Jones, Scott Shepherd, Gary Farmer, Lily Gladstone

Trailer:

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