Search - Follow the River on DVD

Donna B. from FLOMATON, AL
Reviewed on 2/23/2009...

Excellent adventure movie, based on a true story. Once you've seen this movie, you will remember it forever!

0 of 1 member(s) found this review helpful.

Big Disappointment

J. Warren | WA USA | 07/12/2006

(1 out of 5 stars)

"What a watered down, sugar coated telling of this powerful story! The enormity of the physical struggle to walk 6 weeks in the wilderness was portrayed with slightly mussed hair (with a few twigs thrown in) and a spotlessly clean blue frock with ruffled sleeves. In the book, Mary was reduced to stark nakedness and her hair had turned white. This was a very poor rendition of the book and it must surely be an embarassment to the author. The sugar-coated ending with the chief returning the perfectly intact children was the final straw. Arrrgh!"

Truth exaggerated to impossibility, Scenic.

Reliable Reviews Too | Carmel Valley, CA | 04/18/2007

(2 out of 5 stars)

"
The novel, "Follow the River", was based on a true story, and this film is based on that novel.



I read the true story in the book:

"Shawnee Captive: The Story of Mary Draper Ingles" or

"The Long Journey Home: The true story of Mary Draper Ingles"

(Available elsewhere for less money than here).



This film changed the truth just enough to ruin an interesting, true, story. The film is scenic and holds your attention. The men in the story are hapless and helpless.



How many women, in their ninth month of pregnancy, could hike through the forest all day, for days, on short food rations, stop to give birth while leaning against a tree, then immediately start hiking again all day, carrying their baby? A woman wrote the script! Might women benefit from walking all day during pregnancy and right up to giving birth? Is lying in bed really the best way to give birth? Should husbands buy the DVD and book for their complaining pregnant wives? Or was this mindless script-writing? If you click on the comment-button, below, I tell whether such events are true or not.



We are also left wondering whether the very end is true or not.



This film would have been much better, if it had stayed with the key points of truth. You can add things to a true story that do not change the key points of truth. You can add new characters to give more personality whose actions do not effect the key points of truth. You can leave out the uninteresting. You can fill in the gaps and imagine things with historical accuracy without changing the key points of truth. The film, "The Ten Commandments" is a good example; it fills in the gaps of the Biblical story well, and imagines pharaoh's palace, without changing the key points of truth of the Bible's story.



All would have enjoyed more details on how they lived at the time. It is mystifying, that the film's woman writer presented Mary as less smart, than Mary was in the true story. The film portrays Mary not planning and not stocking food for the escape.



If you hit the comment button below, you will see truth separated from fiction in this film, and see the story's true ending. You will see the film changed key points of truth that they should not have changed, which made the film into fiction and impossible as presented (the women taking turns with one blanket in winter). The film also left out the interesting truth. Doing the extra work to find out the truth would have made a much better film.



This film should be re-made, sticking to the truth, under the title of the true story."

Not worth the purchase

JB | Houston, Texas | 10/17/2006

(1 out of 5 stars)

"I am a huge fan of the book. I've read it so many times that some pages are taped back into the book.

The 'Made for TV' film just didn't live up to my expectations. I never would have picked this cast, I wasn't impressed on how cut up and the acting was so-so.

I found this film a huge dissappointment."