Viggo Mortensen, who directed, wrote and stars in “The Dead Don't Hurt,” delivers several different Westerns into one in an honest effort to revive the cinematic Western.
Aside from the deathbed prologue, the film initially appears to be making a statement on the law and order side of the genre. Mortensen, a bereaved sheriff named Holger Olsen, seems skeptical when a town idiot is accused of six murders and clearly claims he doesn't remember any of them. The local court, a makeshift bar-house, is not the most lenient place for wrongfully accused people or anyone else. (At one point, instead of striking the gavel to issue an order, the judge fires his gun upward twice and then looks at the ceiling to make sure the gun doesn't cave in.)
We've already seen the killer. Weston Jeffries (Solly McLeod), the villainous son of Alfred Jeffries (Garret Dillahunt), a major local rancher, is introduced midway through. He is first seen leaving a bar and casually shooting two people at once. A title card appears hanging over a corpse.
But before “Dead Men Hurt” becomes a film about a good sheriff’s efforts to right a wrong of justice, it flashes back to the story of another character, Vivian Le Cudi (played as an adult by Vicky Krieps). Her livelier, more classically armed Western might have kept her off-screen, consigning her to her sheriff's backstory.
Painting on a larger canvas, Mortensen gives his films a nested and sometimes unnecessarily complex structure. (Vivienne's French-Canadian childhood gets its own somewhat unnecessary flashback.) When the grown Vivienne meets Orson (she prefers to call him by his last name), they begin to build a life together. Olsen is a talented carpenter. Vivienne has a knack for shooting birds. She cleans the dusty, dull land and inspires him to add greenery.
But not all is happy on the homestead as the Civil War beckons. Having served as a soldier in his native Denmark, Orson believes it is his moral duty to fight for the Union, leaving Vivienne at home to fight in a war that Orson later points out is his own war, with the marauding Weston as the main antagonist. .
Filming primarily in Durango, Mexico, Mortensen deftly handles divisions of perspective and drama without losing interest or proportion. As Olsen goes off to war, the film hands center stage to Vivienne. The only weak point is the ending, a poetic farewell note that is too gentle compared to the harsh scenes that preceded it and too unconcerned with the subject matter.
Still, it's hard to be too concerned when the acting is this good. Both Krieps and Mortensen benefit immeasurably from cinematographer Marcel Zyskind's sensitive use of sunlight and shadows, while McLeod becomes a terrifying beast. Mortensen's ambitions may be old-fashioned, but they're grand, and he's made them a reality through a stunning passion project.
Dead people don't get hurt
Rated R for gun violence and sexual assault. Running time: 2 hours 9 minutes. Inside the movie theater.