Jeremiah Johnson (1972)

A mountain man who wishes to live the life of a hermit becomes the unwilling object of a long vendetta by Indians, and proves to be a match for their warriors in one-on-one combat on the early frontier.

Director:

Sydney Pollack

Writers:

Vardis Fisher (novel), Raymond W. Thorp (story "Crow Killer")

Stars:

Robert Redford, Will Geer, Delle Bolton

1 win & 1 nomination.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Robert Redford	...	Jeremiah Johnson
Will Geer	...	Bear Claw
Delle Bolton	...	Swan
Josh Albee	...	Caleb
Joaquín Martínez	...	Paints His Shirt Red (as Joaquin Martinez)
Allyn Ann McLerie	...	Crazy Woman
Stefan Gierasch	...	Del Gue
Richard Angarola	...	Chief Two-Tongues Lebeaux
Paul Benedict	...	Reverend Lindquist
Charles Tyner	...	Robidoux
Jack Colvin	...	Lieutenant Mulvey
Matt Clark	...	Qualen

Storyline

During the mid-nineteenth century, Jeremiah Johnson, after a stint in the US Army, decides that he would prefer a life of solitude and more importantly peace by living with nature in the mountains of the frontier of the American west. This plan entails finding a piece of land upon which to build a house. This quest ends up being not quite what he envisioned as he does require the assistance of others to find his footing, and in turn he amasses friends and acquaintances along the way, some who become more a part of his life than he would have imagined. Perhaps most importantly, some of those people provide him with the knowledge of how to co-exist with some of the many Indian tribes, most importantly the Crow, on whose land in Colorado Jeremiah ultimately decides to build his home. But an act by Jeremiah upon a request by the US Cavalry leads to a chain of events that may forever change the peaceful relationship he worked so hard to achieve with his neighbors and their land.

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Plot Keywords:

native american | mountain man | trapper | hermit | rocky mountains | 

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Taglines:

A man of peace driven wild!

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Genres:

Adventure | Drama | Western

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Certificate:

GP

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English Crow French

Release Date:

10 September 1972 (Sweden)

Also Known As:

Crow Killer

Filming Locations:

Kayenta, Arizona, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$3,100,000 (estimated)

Gross USA:

$47,742,000

Company Credits

Production Co:

Sanford Productions (III), Warner Bros.

Technical Specs

Runtime:

108 min 116 min (long)

Sound Mix:

70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints) Mono (35 mm prints) Dolby Digital

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Liver Eatin' Johnston's wife (who was pregnant at the time) was actually killed by a random raiding party of Blackfeet, not as revenge for a violation of their burial grounds. She was killed in the spring while Johnston was off trapping and he didn't return to find her body until several months later. He identified the band that had killed her because he recognized a Tennessee rifle he had given her in the possession of a Blackfeet warrior. Also, rather than isolated incidents as shown in the movie, Johnston often recruited other mountain men as well as Indians (particularly Flatheads) to help him with his vendetta. The part about the warriors sent to kill him and told not to return without his scalp was true.

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Goofs

Throughout the film gunshots are heard as a modern high velocity (crack sound as the bullet is supersonic) rather than the boom of a subsonic blackpowder firearm. Also, the firearm smoke is minimal (modern smokeless powder) modern smokless powder wasn't available until about 1890.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Narrator: His name was Jeremiah Johnson, and they say he wanted to be a mountain man. The story goes that he was a man of proper wit and adventurous spirit, suited to the mountains. Nobody knows whereabouts he come from and don't seem to matter much. He was a young man and ghosty stories about the tall hills didn't scare him none. He was looking for a Hawken gun, .50 caliber or better. He settled for a .30, but damn, it was a genuine Hawken, and you couldn't go no better. Bought him a good ...

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Alternate Versions

DVD release restores the overture and the exit music which were deleted from the VHS releases.

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Connections

Referenced in Farscape: Jeremiah Crichton (1999)

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Soundtracks

Shall We Gather at the River
(uncredited)
Written by Robert Lowry
Performed by Allyn Ann McLerie and Robert Redford

User Reviews

The Rocky Mountains are the marrow of the World.

Jeremiah Johnson is directed by Sydney Pollack and is inspired by two books, Raymond Thorp and Robert Bunker's Crow Killer: The Saga of Liver-Eating Johnson and Vardis Fisher's Mountain Man. Script was written by John Millius and Edward Anhalt and cinematography is by Duke Callaghan. It stars Robert Redford, Will Geer, Stefan Gierasch, Delle Bolton and Josh Albee.

Hardened after the war with Mexico, and fed up with everyday life, American Jeremiah Johnson (Redford) leaves civilisation behind to live life as a mountain man. He intends to be self-sufficient as a trapper, but he finds that mother nature can be tough, and out here in the mountain wilderness he is not alone. There are others here, and Jeremiah must face many challenges if he is to truly survive.

Filmed entirely on location in the vast wilderness beauty of Utah, Jeremiah Johnson is light on plot but all the better for it. Film basically constitutes Redford's mountain man learning to survive up in them thar mountains, and, earning the right to do so. A number of issues will arise to test his metal, giving him a number of hardships and adventures to define his transformation from average Joe to a fully fledged mythical man of the Earth. Redford is wonderfully at ease in the title role, and very quickly he gets the audience on side to share in his journey. But ultimately it's the landscapes that you take away from this movie. Not only gorgeous, but also the critical character that frames Johnson during his isolation and battle for survival. 8/10