Based on the 2011 novella of the same name, Train Dreams depicts the life of Robert Grainier in the first half of the 20th century. It’s a pretty ordinary life. Born without parents, and not quite sociable, Grainier lives a lonely existence, a loneliness that’s interrupted occasionally by talks with his fellow co-workers and the limited time he gets with his family. However, that doesn’t mean it’s boring. Joel Edgerton delivers one of his best performances that subtly depicts his inner world, while writer-director Clint Bentley pairs Grainier’s day-to-day with surreal dreams, feverish imaginings that captures Grainier’s deepest hopes for the people he’s lost. Train Dreams depicts an ordinary life with extraordinary sensitivity.
"Even its lapses and dodges have the effect of only strengthening my admiration for Edgerton, whose grizzled magnetism has seldom been more affecting."
— Justin Chang
"Clint Bentley and co-writer Greg Kwedar capture the grandeur, tragedy and intimacy of Johnson’s work without slipping into nostalgia for an idealised kind of West inhabited by John Wayne."
— Laura Venning
A logger leads a life of quiet grace as he experiences love and loss during an era of monumental change in early 20th-century America.
Nat. Board of Review
2 wins
