My Own Private Idaho

River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves dazzle as male hustlers from opposite sides of the tracks in Gus Van Sant’s Shakespeare-inspired tale.

  • Director

    Gus Van Sant

  • With

    River Phoenix, Keanu Reeves, James Russo, William Richert

  • USA 1991. 104min

  • Digital

  • Certificate

    15

Released around the same time as Todd Haynes’ Poison and Gregg Araki’s The Living End, Van Sant’s third feature marked a formative moment in New Queer Cinema movement of the early 1990s. Possessing an edgy, independent sensibility and frequently reaching back to the American cinema of the 1970s with its elliptical narrative and emphasis on psychological and emotional malaise, this inventive take on Shakespeare’s Henry IV and Henry V refuelled and re-politicised the road movie.