Generation Apathy
A strange movie based on a grim true story, starring some of the up-and-coming movie stars of the era, including Keanu Reeves in one of his first film roles.
River’s Edge is about high school stoner Samson (played convincingly by Daniel Roebuck), who murders a female friend and shows his slacker friends what he has done like it was nothing. It deals with the aftermath and the apathetic reaction the teenagers have to the murder.
Interestingly, riding high on the back of his role as Marty’s father in Back to the Future, Crispin Glover is top billed and has the most screen time playing Layne, the best friend of Samson who is obsessed with figuring out how to get the killer out of trouble. He really plays up the speed tweaking stoner, almost to parody, while Keanu just does it naturally.
It is also the first film role for Ione Skye (billed with her last name Leitch for this movie only. The name coming from her one-name father Donovan), at 16 playing alongside Keanu at 23 – times sure have changed. She has charisma and has gone on to have a varied film career, impressive considering she had no formal training before being plucked for the role.
Dennis Hopper rounds out the strong cast playing his usual maniacal personality. He adds some additional strangeness to the whole thing as the local drug dealer Feck. He’s an actor who often comes across as out of his mind and this is no exception. Having said that, he also shares some of the best scenes in the movie with Roebuck, delving into the apathetic attitude of the cynical, disaffected Generation X.
This is basically what the movie is about, and director Tim Hunter deals with the subject matter well (he didn’t do much else on the big screen). From the teenagers aware of the murder and doing nothing, to the younger pre-teens running amuck with stolen cars, drugs and guns. Are they saying this is only going to get worse?
It is shot well, the soundtrack suits nicely with plenty of Slayer tracks – at the time part of the music being blamed for everything wrong with youth behaviour – and it is a generally good film, despite the bleak picture it paints of the generation; the fact it is based around real events making it all the more poignant. Worth a watch.