Meek’s Cutoff

Directed by Kelly Reichardt

(PG)

****

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In this “inverted wagon wheel” of a Western, women get to be the strong, silent types, said Ella Taylor in NPR.org. Loosely based on the mid-19th-century diaries of women who braved the Oregon Trail, this intensely naturalistic film follows three determined families as their small wagon train slogs west under the leadership of an untrustworthy hired guide. Michelle Williams’s Emily and the other two wives are expected to hold their tongues as they go about “packing, unpacking, and cooking the same dreary meals.” But actions eventually speak louder than words. Williams “anchors the ensemble with a performance of fierce grit and unflinching moral strength,” said Justin Chang in Variety. It is she who first stands up to the “boastful” guide, who’s given a dark edge by Bruce Greenwood. Director Kelly Reichardt’s quietly observant style is so effective at helping us feel the minute-by-minute ardor of the group’s journey “that I half expected to have a sunburn at the end,” said Mary Pols in Time. The story this film tells feels small, but it “resonates afterward with such insistence that I felt positively nagged by it.”