Review: The Salvation

"Do not forsake me O my darlin' / On this our wedding day," go the opening lines of the classic western theme song "The Ballad of High Noon." The subsequent lyrics outline the plot of Fred Zinneman's High Noon: the anticipated noontime showdown between Sheriff Will Kane (Gary Cooper) and Frank Miller and his gang. As the townsfolk and even his new bride (Grace Kelly) urge him to leave town before the shootout, Kane struggles to listen to his conscience and hold steadfast to his convictions. There's little of that crisis of conscience in The Salvation, Kristian Levring's Danish take on the western genre, which spins many of High Noon's elements into a variation of the retribution drama.

Jon (Mads Mikkelsen) is not a sheriff but he is a peaceful man. Survivors of the Danish defeat in the war of 1864, Jon and his brother Peter (Mikael Persbrandt) crossed the Atlantic and spent seven years away from Jon's wife and son in order to establish a home and a future in Black Creek. Their reunion is tragically short-lived when, during their stagecoach ride home, drunken men jettison Jon to rape his wife and then kill her and his son. Jon claims swift justice but vengeance begets more vengeance: one of the murdered men was brother to Delarue (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), the movie's big bad, who swaggers into Black Creek with his posse (which include footballer Eric Cantona) to lay down the law to the town's mayor (Jonathan Pryce), who doubles as the undertaker, and sheriff (Douglas Henshall), who is also a man of the cloth: bring him his brother's killer by high noon or bring him two of the townspeople as sacrifice.

The Salvation is a surprise from Levring, considering his charter membership in the Dogme film movement which mandated the exclusion of technological tricks and assistance in favour of focus on narrative and perforamnce. The film is generic in its narrative and certainly doesn't offer anything new to the genre. It is, however, one of the most visually breathtaking entries with South Africa doubling for the American frontier, necessitating CGI application on some 900 shots.

The sweeping grandeur of the landscape is steeped in foreboding, which may speak to the Danish sensibility, and it's hard not to be enticed by such resplendent compositions: Jon holding his son's lifeless body against the inky blue backdrop of a moonlight sky; the geometric arrangements of the participants in the suspenseful final showdown; even the deep purples of the coats of Delarue's gang or the rich red of Jon's bandana tickle the eye.

As the forsaken groom, Mikkelsen is magnetic, conveying so much with the minutest of motions. His horrified reaction to having to choose between leaving his wife and son to an uncertain fate or staying on the stagecoach to watch them die before his eyes will grip your heart as will a later scene as he watches his brother dragged by horseback by Delarue and his men. Persbrandt, well-regarded in his native Denmark, makes a strong impression as Peter, especially in a scene that has him calmly goading his jailkeeper. Eva Green, playing a mute (the character seems a riff on Natalie Wood's in John Ford's The Searchers), uses her expressive eyes to full effect.

Honourable mention to Kasper Winding's flavourful score, which merits a far superior showcase than Levring's satisfactory but seen-it-before offering.

The Salvation

Directed by: Kristian Levring

Written by: Anders Thomas Jensen, Kristian Levring

Starring: Mads Mikkelsen, Eva Green, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Mikael Persbrandt, Jonathan Pryce, Douglas Henshall, Eric Cantona, Nanna Øland Fabricius, Toke Lars Bjarke