Train Dreams
An ordinary man faces a new century in Clint Bentley’s exquisite, lyrical hymn to a changing world.
A private Idaho: Joel Edgerton (right)
Image courtesy of Netflix.
A cinematic poem fecund with pictorial gifts, Train Dreams is a pocket masterpiece. Adapted from the novella by Denis Johnson, it chronicles the life of a simple man in the Pacific Northwest, a logger who knew not his parents and worked the land with his hands. It was another time and another place, behind the front line of a changing world. Cradled in the rich timbre of Will Patton’s voiceover, the film draws us across the American railroad as our protagonist searches for work and opportunity. Throughout are fleeting, striking images, like snapshots in an old, leatherbound journal, from the opening shot that defies our sense of perspective, to the image of a two-headed calf as espied by the young Robert Grainier.
Grainier, who we follow through his years on earth, is a quiet, contemplative fellow, an observer who wonders how to connect with the world around him. While recognising that this Land of Opportunity was sculpted by the sweat of the Chinese and Africans, he is startled by the casual violence meted out to them. And so such scenes of brutality inform his nightmares, fever dreams that seem to permeate his waking hours as well. He may even be blessed – or cursed – with the gift of prescience.
Knowing no better, Grainier and his co-workers prey on the natural world that sustains them but, as Grainier is to find out to his cost, Nature gives with one hand as She takes with the other. Cutting a swathe through the forests of Idaho, our hero is surprised to learn that some of these steeples of spruce are over 500 years old, while the old timer Arn Peeples (a wonderful William H. Macy) explains that their world is “intricately stitched together.” Likewise, Clint Bentley’s film is an intricately stitched together piece, the sparse, evocative dialogue echoing the beauty of the imagery, along with Bryce Dessner’s poignant score and the sumptuous cinematography of Adolpho Veloso, which uses sunlight for the pulse of the narrative.
As Grainier, Joel Edgerton says little, but his expressive features speak volumes. An awards season hardly goes by without Joel Edgerton popping up somewhere, usually unrecognisable to a wider audience. And yet there he is, in Animal Kingdom, The Great Gatsby, Loving and Boy Erased (which he also directed), playing a wide range of characters with varying accents. Likewise, Felicity Jones seems to be a good luck charm for directors seeking awards’ attention, and again she brings chameleonic distinction to this Oscar contender. Credit, too, must go to Kerry Condon and Nathaniel Arcand, for brief but redolent turns.
A hymn to Nature for both its danger and healing power, Train Dreams must sit alongside such classics of Americana as Jeremiah Johnson, Days of Heaven and Leave No Trace. For those who insist that cinema is no art form, they should let this small miracle into their souls.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Joel Edgerton, Felicity Jones, Kerry Condon, William H. Macy, Nathaniel Arcand, Clifton Collins Jr, John Diehl, Paul Schneider, and the voice of Will Patton.
Dir Clint Bentley, Pro Marissa McMahon, Teddy Schwarzman, Will Janowitz, Ashley Schlaifer and Michael Heimler, Ex Pro Joel Edgerton, Screenplay Clint Bentley and Greg Kwedar, from the novella by Denis Johnmson, Ph Adolpho Veloso, Pro Des Alexandra Schaller, Ed Parker Laramie, Music Bryce Dessner, Costumes Malgosia Turzanska, Dialect coaches Carla Meyer and Tanera Marshall.
Black Bear/Kamala Films-Netflix.
101 mins. USA. 2025. UK and US Rel: 21 November 2025. Cert. 12A.
