A bit too much and a very unbelievable story.

Rating: 5/10 (3 March 2016)

I honestly don't know what to think of this movie. It's good in a way and at the same time awful. To begin with, the idea to the story is interesting. It's set in the 19th century which makes the scenario more complicated than it would be today. But then there is this whole father/son scenario which really makes no sense and seems out of place. There is some back story to it that is scattered out through the film and I understand it's there to add some tension to the movie, but there is no build up to make you feel anything about it and in the end it seems boring and pointless.
It is well made though and most of the scenes seems very real and believable. I sometimes grasped the chair grinning cause I really felt the reality and pain in it. The bear attack for one stands out. The acting is very good and the actors do as much as they can with the script they're given, but as much as I believe Di Caprio deserves an Oscar, I really don't think this role was the one.
The plot could have been more interesting. It looks a bit like they tried to make another "Deliverance" but failed in character development and gravity of the story. Along the way I lost interest since everything seemed to be based around how everything in the wild hurts, and the main character is hurt a lot. Still he seems to survive anything that happens to him, sometimes in the most obscure ways. At the end I didn't really care whether or not he was going to make it back home, even less if he was going to be able to avenge his son, because nothing felt dangerous anymore. I was just hoping for the movie to end because it felt way too long. They could easily have made this an hour shorter which I think would have made it more exciting and less dragged out.
Warning! Spoilers ahead!
There were a number of things bothering me about this movie but what bothered me the most is that there is a huge lack of credibility throughout some parts of it, especially since it's supposed to be based on real events:
Mostly I was annoyed by the fact that he seems to take any chance he has to jump into the water and have a swim. Everyone who has been living in a place cold enough for it to snow during the winter knows that falling into ice-cold water when it's that cold outside, is equal to freezing to death if you don't manage to get out of your clothes and get warm somehow. Yet he barely seems to freeze at all. It's snowing and there are ice floes in the water for God's sake! In reality he would have been dead by the time he reached the riverbank, and certainly after his "nap". Seems like the movie makers forgot to do some research about hypothermia.
After the bear attack his foot is clearly broken and points in the wrong direction. Yet he manages to crawl off and swim down the rapids in ice-cold water only to be able to walk out of the river on his now miraculously healed foot.
The only problem to him surviving seems to be the injuries he suffered from the bear attack. I mean he even rides off a cliff and survives the fall only to miraculously survive yet another cold night of snow storms.
Why do they eat raw meat when they clearly have made a fire two steps away where they could cook it? It makes no sense.
All the lines delivered by the native Americans seemed out of sync for some reason, which is weird since todays technology in syncing picture and audio is quite developed.
All in all it's an interesting story but a bit boring and unbelievable way to tell it. I would have bought it if it was a fictional story, but this time it's based on real events. If you want to revel in pain, suffering and misery, and if you like to watch a movie about how hard it was back in the 19th century, please go ahead, but there are better ways to spend your money.