The Dead Don’t Hurt begins with two images atypical of a Western – a knight in shining armor riding on horseback and an extended shot of a sick woman on her deathbed. Both are quiet, lack dialogue and demonstrate a patience rare in an actor-director. But this abstract filmmaking gives way to different timelines, including a romance between Holger Olsen (Viggo Mortenson), a carpenter from Denmark, and Vivienne Le Coudy (Vicky Krieps), a headstrong French-Canadian who grows and sells flowers and who we learn early on is the woman who dies in the opening. Flashbacks reveal Vivienne’s upbringing and ascendence to becoming self-reliant, and the present-day storyline follows Holger and his young son burying Vivienne and setting off west.
Beyond Vivienne, death permeates through the film, where, within the first 15 minutes of screentime, numerous men are gunned down at the town saloon and another is hanged after being found guilty for the murders. But this doesn’t completely eliminate the possibility of levity. Shortly after meeting Holger, Vivienne takes him to an art exhibition. She playfully catches her “friend” off guard, intentionally running into her ex (Colin Morgan), who is hosting the gathering at his luxurious house, and hinting to him that she and Holger are in a relationship. In another scene, Vivienne decides to travel with Holger to his home in Nevada and is shocked when she finds that he lives in a little, mostly isolated cabin. Surely thoughts of “How did I end up with this guy?” crossed her mind after being drawn in by his sweet talking and tales of exploration and adventure.
It’s a promising start, but The Dead Don’t Hurt loses its way when it falls into the familiar rhythm of the average Western. The town is populated by characters that are more like archetypes than people. The entitled troublemaker and man in black, Weston Jeffries (Solly McLeod), receives protection from his rich businessman father, Alfred (Garret Dillahunt), and the crooked Mayor Rudolph Schiller (Danny Huston). Vivienne asks saloon keeper Alan Kendall (W. Earl Brown) for a job, but instead of serving drinks to customers, she spends most of her time taking misogynistic abuse from Weston. The rest of the romance plot goes as expected, despite the unconventional narrative structure doing its best to throw some curveballs.
The screenplay also attempts to differentiate the film from the pack with its dialogue but often comes up short. When describing his motivation for coming to San Francisco to Vivienne, Holger says he “wanted to see the end of the world.” It’s the type of poetic language that only has meaning when supported by significant observation or real character development, but the story is insufficient in these areas. The fact that the two lovers are immigrants also doesn’t lead to any notable reflections, and the dialogue featured in Vivienne and Holger’s interactions is tired, consisting of lines that have lost their charm much earlier in an average viewer’s filmgoing experience.
Although The Dead Don’t Hurt may culminate in a realistic ending for the characters, narratively, it is unfulfilling. Many Westerns fall into the “it’s less about the destination than the journey” category, but the conclusion still should have some sort of emotional or thematic payoff for the protagonist. While the film thankfully doesn’t fall in line structurally with the middle-of-the-road revenge Western, most of the ambitious swings are unsuccessful and result in a piece that only garners moderate interest.
Photo courtesy of SHOUT! STUDIOS
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