The Western gallops into theaters this May.
The Big Picture
- Viggo Mortensen’s
The Dead Don’t Hurt
is a love story set during the Civil War, featuring vengeance and complex characters. - The film’s new image teases action-packed scenes and accurately sets the period and tone.
- Described as a Western, the movie focuses on a woman creating new frontiers in a corrupt town.
Viggo Mortensen has returned to the director’s chair to bring the audience a story of star-crossed lovers set in the backdrop of the Civil War, The Dead Don’t Hurt. The Western made its world debut at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival and garnered much appreciation from the critics before setting a release date for the coming May. As the release date nears, we are getting new looks at the feature to get to know this story a little better.
The new image (via Total Film) sees Mortensen along with a young child on a horse making their way to somewhere in a bit of a hurry. While the image doesn’t give away much, it elaborates on the period and setting of the feature accurately. As well as showcases the action-packed, vengeance-filled tone of the film which we have previously seen in the official trailer.
What’s ‘The Dead Don’t Hurt’ About?
Mortensen directs from his own script that follows two star-crossed lovers Vivienne Le Coudy and Holger Olsen. When her lover goes off to fight in the Civil War, Vivienne is left behind to fend for herself in a town controlled by a corrupt mayor and his business partner. When Olsen returns from the war, he sets out to inflict terrible vengeance upon those who wronged her. As they navigate and make peace with the person each has become.
Speaking to Collider previously, the director described the movie as “a story about a woman, essentially, but it’s a love story centered around the female character.” Elaborating on the genre, he said, “It’s in the Western genre. Western movies are usually about taming the frontier or expanding the frontier of the nation or establishing what the frontiers are, and I thought that would be a perfect setting in which to tell a story that’s essentially about a woman who is creating new frontiers just by being herself.”
Along with Mortensen as Holger Olsen and Vicky Krieps as Vivienne Le Coudy, the movie also cast Garret Dillahunt as Alfred Jeffries, Solly McLeod as Weston Jeffries, Danny Huston as Mayor Rudolph Schiller, and Nadia Litz as Martha Gilkyson. Further rounding off the cast are W. Earl Brown as Alan Kendall, Marc Dennis as Fishmonger Stevens, John Getz as Reverend Simpson, and Ray McKinnon as Judge Blagden.
The Dead Don’t Hurt will arrive in theatres on May 31. You can check out the new image above and read our review here.
The Dead Don’t Hurt (2023)
Set in the 1860s, the fiercely independent French Canadian Vivienne Le Coudy embarks on a relationship with Danish immigrant Holger Olsen.
- Release Date
- September 8, 2023
- Director
- Viggo Mortensen
- Cast
- Vicky Krieps , Viggo Mortensen , Solly McLeod , Garret Dillahunt , W. Earl Brown , Danny Huston , Shane Graham , Rafel Plana
- Runtime
- 129 Minutes
- Main Genre
- Drama
- Writers
- Viggo Mortensen
This article was originally published on collider.com