The River Wild

April 17, 2017
Screenwriter O’Neill successfully adapts his 1994 movie The River Wild to the page. In an effort to save her floundering marriage, lawyer Gail MacDonald, a resident of Brookline, Mass., takes her architect husband, Tom, and their 13-year-old son, Roarke, to ride the rapids in Montana’s Lewis and Clark National Forest, where she once guided raft trips. At their campsite, they encounter two men, murderer William Deakens “Deke” Patterson and rapist Terrance “Terry” Everton O’Reilly, who have just escaped from prison. The convicts, determined to elude law enforcement, compel the MacDonalds to travel down the river with Gail as their guide. Gail knows that, even if she can get them all safely past the violent rapids known as the Gauntlet, her family will be killed when they’re no longer useful to Deke and Terry. Meanwhile, Det. Lt. Bobby Long of the Montana State Police and his assistant, William “Billy” Heston, are trying to locate the escapees, but they have no leads. O’Neill pits man against man and man against nature in this gripping thriller.