Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more
 

Alive (1993)

Director: Frank Marshall

Average user rating
8 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

1972: a plane crashes in the Andes. Despite sub-zero temperatures and scarce supplies, the survivors hold out for a rescue party. On the eighth day, they hear a radio report: they've been given up for dead. Little by little, the unthinkable becomes unavoidable. If they are to survive, they must cannibalise the corpses frozen in ice. In adapting Piers Paul Read's account of the Andes air disaster, Marshall and screenwriter John Patrick Shanley address any moral squeamishness head-on: in this do-or-die situation, they insist, the greater sin would be to die. It's not quite fair to say that this is the first tasteful cannibalism picture (the crash itself is a tour de force, and the camera never shies away from the meat of the matter), but this spiritual disaster movie does sometimes feel like a papal injunction. Within 30 seconds we're in the presence of God - or at least bearded John Malkovich is musing to that effect. Rosaries, prayers and carols are never far away after that, and over the end credits Aaron Neville lets fly with Ave Maria. Skilfully crafted and doggedly performed, the film pushes too hard and too far; it strives for the inspirational but falls well short of inspired.

Author: TCh 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide

  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

User reviews of this film

8 comments

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields


Cast & crew

Director: Frank Marshall

Producer: Robert Watts, Kathleen Kennedy

Cast: Ethan Hawke, Vincent Spano, Josh Hamilton, Illeana Douglas, Sam Behrens, Ele Keats, John Malkovich full cast

Duration: 127 mins


Features

Making a name for himself

Making a name for himself

Sin Nombre's Cary Joji Fukunaga learned his lessons well.

To the letter

Forty years later, Costa-Gavras's Z still brims with fury.

Mind over matter

David Cronenberg reflects on a most bizarre body: his own corpus of work.

Fool's gold

Can an Oscar win lead to a cursed career? Here are five stories of postaward professional meltdowns.

We are the championed

Terrorists and teens abound in this year's "Film Comment Selects."

A history of violence

Matteo Garrone's kaleidoscopic Gomorrah wallops you with Italy's crime crisis.

True romantic

James Gray exchanges urban amorality for amour in Two Lovers.

Playing in the dark

MoMA salutes pianist Stuart Oderman's 50 years as the one-man sound of silents.

Junk bonds

Cast and crew recall the making of the classic NYC drug drama The Panic in Needle Park.