# Ride with the Devil (1999/I)

### reviewed by
Jon Popick

PLANET SICK-BOY: http://www.sick-boy.com

Question: What do you get when you blend Gone with the Wind and Glory?

Answer #1: The cinematic equivalent of Viagra for your excitable high school history teacher that still spends his weekends reenacting the battles of the Civil War with other middle-age losers/fanatics.

Answer #2: Ride with the Devil, a movie about the Civil War made by a Taiwanese filmmaker.

A Taiwanese filmmaker? Making a Civil War picture? Why, that sounds as preposterous as Spaniard Antonio Banderas directing a film about 1965 Alabama! But Ang Lee is no ordinary filmmaker. His resume is nearly as diverse as indie icon John Sayles, knocking out movies about the frocky (Sense and Sensibility), retro sex (The Ice Storm), cultural contrast (Pushing Hands), the love of food (Eat Drink Man Woman) and taboo relationships (The Wedding Banquet).

Although Ride with the Devil is a remarkably beautiful film, it offers nothing that we haven't already seen in Gone with the Wind and Glory. It's also a balanced movie, meaning that war buffs will have to wait for extended periods between battle scenes. The ending is weak and the film is not nearly emotional as it could be. Yet, somehow, Devil is still entertainingly captivating.

Based on Daniel Woodrell's novel `Woe to Live On,' the film focuses on one Jake Roedel (Tobey Maguire, Pleasantville), the son of a pro-Union German immigrant transplanted in Missouri. Like other Southern boys, Jake is eager to bear arms in order to maintain their Southern way of life. Jake and his best friend Jack Bull Chiles (Skeet Ulrich, Chill Factor), the son of a wealthy plantation owner, join a rogue group of Confederate fighters known as `Bushwhackers.'

Banded together with rich boy George Clyde (Simon Baker-Denny, L.A. Confidential) and ex-slave Daniel Holt (Jeffrey Wright, Basquiat), Jake and Jack Bull pull off a particularly savage raid of a group of the Union soldiers believed to be responsible for the murder of Jack Bull's father. After the attack, the men lay low by holing up for the harsh winter in what is essentially a cave, with a young widow named Sue Lee Shelley (hippie songstress Jewel Kilcher) supplying their provisions. Later, the fabulously endowed Ms. Kilcher has a provocative breast-feeding scene that ranks as one of the best ever.

Adapted for the screen by The Ice Storm scribe James Schamus, Devil is a hypnotic combination of love and war that also has a great sense of humor. Behind the scenes, Lee's production team creates some of the more lush scenes of the cinematic year. Devil's graphically violent battle scenes are extremely well done, as is the portrayal of the evolving friendship between Jake and Holt. Neither is completely trusted by their cohorts, continually having their loyalty questioned by fellow Bushwackers despite their obvious devotion to the Southern cause. Holt (played in Oscar-worthy fashion by Wright) is somehow still sympathetic to the Confederacy despite a life of slavery, while Jack is seen as a German first and a Southerner second. They are both victims of ethnic intolerance. And, yes, Spike Lee will probably blow a gasket over the use of the dreaded `n' word.

2:18 - R for graphic war violence, brief nudity, adult situations and sexual content

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