Review of Montana Story 2022 | Film Summary. The wide-open vistas and panoramic views of snow-capped mountains contrast sharply with the small, intensely personal drama at the heart of Scott McGehee and David Siegel’s Montana Story. The grandeur of Big Sky Country, captured with majesty and elegance by cinematographer Giles Nuttgens’ lenses, serves as the backdrop for an intimate story of tragedy and reconnection that is as captivating as the landscape in which it takes place. Free Movie Montana Story Lookmovie online in HD.
A man is on his deathbed. He breathes only because of the equipment attached to him, as a result of a massive stroke that reduced him to a mental vegetable. Ace (Gilbert Owuor), a full-time nurse from Kenya, keeps an eye on him 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Valentina (Kimberly Guerrero), his housekeeper, visits him on a regular basis. Everything is in limbo when two adult children return home for one last visit with their father, who is in such a state that he will never know they are there.
However, this is not the case of a loving son and daughter paying their respects. Cal (Owen Teague) is conflicted about the dying man. Erin (Haley Lu Richardson) is cold and brittle when she arrives unexpectedly from her home in upstate New York. She’s come for reasons she doesn’t fully understand, possibly to gloat over this example of karma or to seek closure for the event that drove her out of Montana and cut off communication with her brother and father.
Cal and Erin, once close, are now strangers, separated by an emotional chasm greater than that which would naturally develop after seven years apart. The film does not reveal what caused the breach right away, instead focusing on their current interaction, which is concerned with the fate of a 25-year-old horse they both adore. Cal believes that euthanasia is the most humane solution; Erin is determined to bring him back home to live out his final days with her. The animal is the only thing she remembers about her childhood home.
McGehee and Siegel carefully reveal the critical event (and without the use of flashbacks). Cal tells Ace about it during a conversation, and we can hear the guilt and self-blame in his voice. Although their father was to blame, Erin sees Cal’s inaction as a betrayal of their bond, and he has come to accept her point of view over time. When she says that the lowest circle of hell in Dante’s Inferno is reserved for “betrayers of special relationships,” she leaves no room for ambiguity. However, as a thunderstorm rages overhead and the power goes out (muting the equipment that keeps their father’s vital systems running), they are forced to confront the poison that has seeped into their relationship.
Cal and Erin’s interaction is kept low-key and believable, and Montana Story is wise enough not to resort to the cheap theatrics and histrionics that define bad melodrama. Owen Teague’s portrayal of the withdrawn Cal complements Haley Lu Richardson’s depiction of barely controlled rage. Other actors, including Gilbert Owuor, Kimberly Guerrero, and Asivak Koostachin (as Valentina’s son), play supporting roles in the film, but the leads steal the show.
Nuttgens is the third frontline contributor (along with Teague and Richardson), and his work sometimes overshadows what the actors are doing. Early in the film, when Cal emerges from the house, our attention is so focused on the view from the porch that we lose track of what he’s doing. But Montana Story isn’t some film student’s attempt to replace plot with images. The visuals are important, but they never overpower the very human, very relatable story at the heart of it all.