Personal Stills

Production Stills

SYNOPSIS
Lawford, New Hampshire, a harsh winter. Wade Whitehouse, Lawford's only policeman, is divorced and lives alone in a trailer, beset by toothache, drinking heavily and forced to work menial jobs. He is unloved by his young daughter Jill and burdened by his elderly father Glen, an alcoholic who used to beat him. But he maintains a relationship with Margie and phone friendship with his younger brother Rolfe, a history professor in Boston. When a wealthy weekend visitor dies in a deer-hunting accident, Wade suspects first murder, then a conspiracy. But he is distracted from his ham-fisted attempts at investigation by the death of his mother (which brings Rolfe back to town for the first time in years), by his anguished steps to regain custody of Jill from his ex-wife Lillian, and by excruciating toothache. He abducts Jill and when she fearfully resists him, he hits her. Chastened, he allows Margie, who is leaving him for good, to take Jill back to her mother. Glen taunts him, and father and son launch into a brawl which ends with Wade killing the old man and burning his corpse. Rolfe, who has been the film's narrator, explains that the supposed conspiracy was all in Wade's imagination, and that Wade's circumstances are now unknown.

CREDITS
Producer: Linda Reisman
Co-producers: Eric Berg, Frank K. Isaacs
Screenplay: Paul Schrader, based on the novel by Russell Banks
Cinematography: Paul Sarossy
Editor: Jay Rabinowitz
Production designer: Anne Pritchard

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