The Edge (film)

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The Edge
Original theatrical poster
Directed by	Lee Tamahori
Produced by	Art Linson
Written by	David Mamet
Starring	Anthony Hopkins Alec Baldwin Harold Perrineau Elle Macpherson Bart the Bear
Music by	Jerry Goldsmith
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date(s)	September 26, 1997
Language	English
Budget	Unknown
IMDb profile

The Edge is a 1997 survival and relationship drama film directed by Lee Tamahori starring Anthony Hopkins as billionaire magazine publicist Charles Morse and Alec Baldwin as Robert Green, one of his ambitious employees. Harold Perrineau also co-stars as the group's photographer Stephen. Elle Macpherson has a supporting role as Hopkins' trophy wife and model for his magazine. Her presence in the beginning of the movie acts as a catalyst for the film's bold male rivalry between Baldwin and Hopkins.

The movie was written by David Mamet and, despite the unusual setting, it touches upon many themes common to Mamet's other works, including the use of strong male characters, tough posturings and playful surprises. The story explores, through action and intricate dialog, the strong male survival instincts of these characters in terms of their competition with each other and with their environment.

1 Tagline
2 Synopsis
3 DVD release
4 External links

[edit] Tagline

They were fighting over a woman when the plane went down. Now, their only chance for survival is each other.

[edit] Synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Morse and Green, along with their friend and photographer Stephen are flying in a small plane over a mountainous region of rural Alaska. Morse discusses with Green that he is merely using his friendship Morse to benefit himself through Morse's proximal wealth, benevolence and generosity. Morse concludes by saying that Green is after his wife, which Green denies and tries to pass off as a joke. Finally Morse states that the only logical course that Green will take is to kill him, and he asks when he plans to do it.

Seconds after Morse poses the question to Green, the plane flies into a flock of birds, which penetrate the cockpit, kill the pilot, and disable the plane. The plane crashes into a lake, taking the pilot with it to the depths. The others escape to the shore. There is constant competition between Morse and Green, over how to survive. After some troubled attempts to light a fire, they finally succeed by using a signal flare to start the blaze and thus evade the onsetting hypothermia. The next day the men try to find a way out of the wilderness and begin walking in the direction they think is correct. They end up going in a circle unfortunately because their makeshift compass, made from a magnetized paperclip floating in water, gives a false reading of North because of a large metal belt buckle worn by Morse which disrupts its detection of the magnetic poles. Making matters worse, the men encounter a huge and aggressive grizzly bear which they narrowly avoid by crossing a raging river via a makeshift log bridge. During this, Morse is nearly swept over a waterfall and loses the remaining signal flares.

The exhausted men settle down for another cold windy night at the camp they had meant to leave behind the previous morning. Stephen hurts himself with a knife, cutting his leg very badly. Morse bandages his leg. Morse then goes to gather firewood and returns to find the bloody cloth used to blot Stephen's wound stuck to a tree, blowing in the breeze. He angrily demands to know why the used remnant was not buried in the ground as he instructed. Green replies that he did not think it was necessary. Morse irritatedly explains that the smell of blood on the breeze could have been blown for miles and might attract wild animals. He then instructs Green to remove it from the tree but Green vehemently refuses, due to the thunderstorm raging overhead.

As the men argue over this, Stephen hears some large movement in the trees, and sees the grizzly bear that chased them earlier approaching on the trail of the scent of the blood. The bear terrorizes the camp and rips Stephen apart, then proceeeds to devour him. Morse and Green flee in fear and believe they have seen the last of the bear. They decide they need to stay on the move, all the while looking for a way to get rescued.

However, much to their surprise, the bear continues to hunt them relentlessly, showing up beside Morse who had been fishing for hours in a river. They flee, protecting themselves by lighting a ring of fire around them, which burns out the next morning. The men decide they must kill the bear or be killed. Green is despairing, believing they will eventually be killed, however Morse refuses to give up. He antagonises Green until he is willing to make a stand and fight.

They form a plan to kill the bear. They lure it with the smell of their own blood on a handkerchief in the breeze, then lead the bear down to a location they had prepared with long strong sharpened spears carved from nearby wood. The bear closes with them and they taunt it, willing it to rear up and charge them. They succeed, though Green is injured; as the bear rears up on its hind legs, Morse jams his spear into the ground and impales the bear under the power of its own weight, killing it.

Hopkins as Charles Morse

After they kill the bear, things begin to go better for them, as they now have food, can make protective clothing from the bear's pelt, and are no longer being pursued. They make the long slow journey back to civilization, having realized that search parties will no longer be checking their area. They find an old shack, a hunting station with a large rifle, and use it for shelter. They resume their dispute over Morse's wife and Green's supposed intent of killing Morse. The conflict is exacerbated when Morse finds a receipt (for the watch given to him as a birthday present by his wife) which shows that Green too received a watch from Morse's wife, and that Green's wristwatch has an incriminating engraving confirming Morse's suspicions of Green having an affair with his wife.

Morse's suppositions prove to be correct, as after consuming some alcohol found in the shack, Green loads the hunting rifle and orders Morse out of the shack. Green believes that he can make it back to civilization alone using a canoe at the shack. Morse confronts Green with his adultery, all the while at gun point. Morse stares Green down and forces him to back away. Green, still planning to shoot Morse, backs into a spike pit set for bears, where his leg is impaled on a spike.

Green now believes he will kill him, but Morse pulls Green out of the hole and tends to his wounds as best he can. They take the canoe and go downriver. They stop the canoe on a river back in an open clearing, where Morse starts a fire to keep them warm, but Green is losing lots of blood from his leg wound. A helicopter spots the two men, but Green apologises and dies before it lands.

Morse returns to his wife and gives her her lover`s watch. He tells the press the others died heroically.

Hopkins` character is portrayed as having superior cunning, and the utmost integrity, the latter of which appear to have been directly influenced by his experiences in the wild. Baldwin`s antagonist is darker. The ending hints that had Baldwin's character survived, the official portrayal of events might have been different.