Movie Review: A Look Back at 'My Own Private Idaho'

The classic on this week’s Everybody’s a Critic Movie Review Podcast is in honor of John Wick Chapter 3 Parabellum. My Own Private Idaho stars Keanu Reeves opposite River Phoenix as hustlers living in the Pacific Northwest. Reeves is the supporting player to Phoenix’s lead, and in that supporting role, Reeves has rarely been as complex and layered. Working opposite River Phoenix appears to have brought something out of Reeves that we’ve rarely seen in the years since.

My Own Private Idaho stars River Phoenix as Mike. Mike is an orphan who suffers from narcolepsy, and works as a gay male hustler. That’s a lot of colorful detail, and yet the movie is not colorful. Mike’s only solace is his friendship with Scott (Reeves) who cares for him when his narcolepsy takes him in a public place. Mike and Scott have come of age together on the streets of Portland under the watchful tutelage of Bob (William Richert), a Fagin for the 90s.

There really isn’t much of a story to My Own Private Idaho. Mike wants to find his mother, she went missing years earlier. Mike has received a few clues as to where she might be, and Scott goes along with Mike, carrying him along the way when the stresses of travel, and the emotions of continued failure causes Mike’s narcolepsy to kick in. That Mike loves Scott is something that will become clear, that Scott does not reciprocate those feelings is yet another stressor for Mike’s condition.

The search for Mike’s mom is the one thing that resembles a plot in My Own Private Idaho, but it’s really more of an excuse to keep Mike and Scott moving from Portland to Idaho and even on to Rome, Italy, with a series of chance encounters that are unique and compelling, unexpected, and often quite emotional. Mike’s life is all about unrequited love, his mother, Scott, and even aspects of his chosen profession.

Director Gus Van Sant is known for his esoteric, observational direction. Sometimes that is defined by a plotlessness that can feel inert as in Gerry or Last Days. Sometimes that esoterica leads to something like Elephant, a fascinating experiment in storytelling that takes on a school shooting from a perspective that is unlike anything that has approached such a frightening and sensitive subject.

My Own Private Idaho stands apart from Gerry and Last Days by having a pair of star performers who are allowed to be charismatic and engaging. Matt Damon and Casey Affleck were movie stars in Gerry, but they were restrained by Van Sant’s intentionally obtuse direction. Gerry is an anti-movie in which the stars were at the mercy of Van Sant’s intent to challenge the audience to walk out on the movie.

River Phoenix is a magnetic presence, you can’t help but become fascinated by his handsome beauty and eyes that contain multitudes. His sadness is charismatic, and his performance has the electricity that only a movie star can generate. Keanu Reeves matches Phoenix in an unexpected fashion. Reeves is an actor who is at his best with a director with a firm, hands on approach, and Van Sant, for as odd as his approach can be, does carry a strong perspective.

I adore the ending of My Own Private Idaho, even as it is the kind of ending that many would find maddening. Spoilers, sort of, if spoilers are possible for a movie that doesn’t truly have a plot: Mike is alone on the highway in Idaho, expounding on the unending road ahead when his narcolepsy kicks in and he falls in the middle of the road. A vehicle pulls up and two men leap out and rob Mike of his backpack and shoes.

As the thieves run off, another vehicle approaches and Van Sant’s camera has pulled back to a God’s Eye perspective with Mike and this new vehicle and driver in the middle distance. Mike and Scott have been estranged for some time as this occurs, with Scott having seemingly accepted his place among the moneyed elite that was his inheritance, and having abandoned his former life, including the man who professed love for him.

At the distance we are at, we can’t see who has stopped to help Mike, but it kind of looks like Scott. An optimistic read would have it be Scott rescuing Mike, and the two live happily ever after. My read however, is that Mike has died on the road and Scott arriving to rescue him again and keep him safe as he sleeps is his version of heaven, his own Private Idaho, a place where he can feel safe, and at home in the way he did as a baby with his mother.

We will discuss Keanu Reeves’s best performances on the next Everyone’s a Critic Movie Review Podcast with a conversation about the John Wick franchise and My Own Private Idaho.