The Mosquito Coast (1986)

• Year: 1986
• Released: 26 Nov 1986
• Country: United States
• Adwords: 1 win & 3 nominations
• IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091557/
• Rotten Tomatoes: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/The_Mosquito_Coast
• Metacritics: https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-mosquito-coast
• Available in: 1080p,
• Language: English, Spanish
• MPA Rating: PG
• Genre: Adventure, Drama, Thriller
• Runtime: 117 min
• Writer: Paul Theroux, Paul Schrader
• Director: Peter Weir
• Cast: Harrison Ford, Helen Mirren, River Phoenix
• Keywords: nature, idealist, idealism, emigrant, paradise,

	6.6/10
	49/100
	76% – Critics
	61% – Audience

The Mosquito Coast Storyline

American Allie Fox (Harrison Ford) is a genius, especially when it comes to anything mechanical, and an idealist. He dropped out of Harvard to become an inventor, he now with nine patents and six pending. He loves the U.S., but is disillusioned by what it has become in so many different facets. As such, he unilaterally decides to uproot his family – his wife, who he affectionately calls “Mother” (Dame Helen Mirren), their two sons Charlie (River Phoenix) and Jerry (Jadrien Steele), and their twin daughters April (Hilary Gordon) and Clover (Rebecca Gordon) – from their comfortable New England life to move to the jungles of Central America, most specifically Mosquitia. There, he hopes to start from scratch to build a society closer to his own ideals, his utopia. He believes he is doing this not just for himself, but for his family, as he wants his children to learn from real-life as opposed to books. Allie will learn that he may have his own view of what he wants to achieve, but that there are external forces, both human and non-human, that may conspire against him. Outwardly, chief amongst his human obstacles is missionary Reverend Spellgood (Andre Gregory), whose work Allie believes is solely narcissistic propaganda. In turn, Reverend Spellgood believes Allie is a Communist. But what may be lurking underneath the surface as another obstacle is Allie’s own family, who may ultimately rebel against something in which they had no input, especially as Allie has a policy of anyone being free to leave if they want, but be excommunicated from the family forever. Allie, too, will have to decide how far he will go to achieve his ultimate dream.

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Crazy Harrison Ford

Allie Fox (Harrison Ford) is an eccentric inventor who is a know-it-all. He feels superior to everybody else, and is always angry at the world. One day, he decides to pack up his family (Helen Mirren, River Phoenix) and move to Central America in a region called the Mosquito Coast. He then buys his own ramshackle town and starts building including a big ice factory. He doesn’t get along with the preacher neighbor Reverend Spellgood. Then three thugs with guns invade their isolation.

Harrison Ford is crazy in this one. If you’re looking to watch a mad man, then this is your movie. However it’s impossible to root for this family. In a rare movie, River Phoenix is completely overshadowed by the manic Ford. It’s possibly one of the more maddening movies around. It should be much more compelling. It should be a great viewing experience. But it must feel like what it is to be part of that family. Every time there is hope for this movie, the father maddeningly destroys it.

A precursor to “Fight Club”?

When I took an Australian cinema class in summer 2003, we talked about how a common theme in Australian movies is communication issues. In “Walkabout”, the sister can’t communicate with the Aborigine but the brother can; in “Picnic at Hanging Rock”, it never gets communicated what happens; in “Strictly Ballroom”, they portray dancing (physical communication).

Peter Weir made his American debut with “Witness”, in which Harrison Ford’s character has to communicate with the Amish. In Weir’s “The Mosquito Coast”, Ford plays Allie Fox, a man disgusted with American society and how it communicates junk to everyone. Moving his family to Central America, Fox hopes to create a utopia but just the opposite happens.

This seems like many situations that we’ve seen, so maybe “The Mosquito Coast” is nothing special. But it’s certainly worth seeing, if only to look for communication issues. I wonder whether it was a sort of precursor to “Fight Club”.

An unsatisfying outcome to a story involving a highly self-absorbed and egocentric genius

While this movie starts with a promising storyline and a character that while not always likable (and quite self-absorbed for the entirety of the film), still has interesting thoughts on the American way of living and an incredible craftsmanship, it soon leaves you with disdain about this character and the interest that had been developed in the 1st hour of the movie soon turns into a drag, leaving you feeling frustrated about why these characters are being silent towards the father’s reckless and almost-deadly treatment. The father turns from a man with a vision of building a civilisation from scratch into a man obsessed with not abiding to any form of current civilisation and living. He drags his family through dangerous situations for the sole purpose of making a living based on his narrow-minded view of how humans should live life. And while this could still make for an interesting storyline, the sole outcome of the terrain his family experiences is that with his sudden passing, they can now be free to live life the way they want to – a somehow unsatisfying final outcome when you consider the ordeal these people had to go through.