There’s a strain of American pastoral cinema that found a patron saint in Terrence Malick and talismans in the solemn reveries of Badlands and Days of Heaven. Train Dreams belongs to this tradition, and it’s a thing of beauty. Based on the novella by Denis Johnson and set in the Pacific Northwest during the first half of the last century, the film stars Joel Edgerton as Robert Grenier, a lumberjack returning logging camps season after season. As the years roll on, Robert finds a wife in Gladys (Felicity Jones), but also hardship and tragedy as the railroads stretch out and the country grows old (or maybe it’s just the face in the mirror).
Director Clint Bentley (Jockey) has made a subtle, ruminative film about the fleeting encounters and foundational relationships that mark a character and eventually constitute a life. With an evocative score by Bryce Dessner of The National and a string of memorable cameos, the movie seems simple but builds an emotional undertow, and Cascadia has rarely looked so luminous on screen.
Missed it at VIFF? Catch it at the VIFF Centre after the festival.
Joel Edgerton, Felicity Jones, Kerry Condon, William H. Macy, Paul Schneider
USA
2025
English
At Granville Island Stage
At The Rio
Book Tickets
Credits & Director
Executive Producer
Joel Edgerton, Scott Hinckley, Greg Kwedar, John Friedberg
Producer
Marissa McMahon, Teddy Schwarzman, William Janowitz, Ashley Schlaifer, Michael Heimler
Screenwriter
Clint Bentley, Greg Kwedar
Cinematography
Adolpho Veloso
Editor
Parker Laramie
Production Design
Alexandra Schaller
Original Music
Bryce Dessner
Clint Bentley
Filmography: Jockey (2021)
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Train Dreams
A lovely, ruminative movie set in the Pacific Northwest in the first half of the last century. Robert (Joel Edgerton) is a lumberjack, a taciturn man who comes to appreciate the life slipping between his fingers.
