American movies don’t come much smaller, subtler, or swoonier with tactile experience than Kelly Reichardt’s film, where a rare commitment to heartfelt naturalism keeps the proceedings free of bull and cool-indie toxins. In Portland, Oregon, one old college friend calls another: let’s get lost, just for a few days, in the Cascades. Mark (Daniel London) is a watchful father-to-be; Kurt (Will Oldham) is an unmarried searcher still living the dorm paradigm with odd jobs and a headful of weed. They head for a hot-springs retreat in the forest, can’t find it, camp elsewhere, then arrive and kick back. That’s it, but we see much more: Old Joy might be the only film ever made about that universal moment when the bonds of youth begin to rust and become irrelevant beneath the pressures of age and responsibility. The moist wilderness is unforgettably sensual, but it’s the men’s unspoken conflict with time and each other that’s finally haunting.

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