With its beautiful landscapes coloring an artful story of emotion and violence, Viggo Mortensen’s The Dead Don’t Hurt, exists between the worlds of Claude Lelouch’s 1977, Another Man, Another Chance, and the western films of Andre De Toth. Scored, written and directed by (and starring) Mortensen, the film is a contemplative and focused picture that stands as the best of the two films the actor has, thus far, directed.

What Mortensen has created is a film with the feel and sensibilities of a classic western, but one infused with deeper subtext. As writer and director, he uses the moral and social codes of the 1860s period setting to tell the story of a woman who cuts her own path of independence in a time of male-dominated brutality and corruption. In the telling of this tale, Mortensen reflects on America then and now and how loyalty and truth have long crumbled while the respect for women and their rights should be a foundation of any society.

An excellent Vicky Krieps is Vivienne Le Coudy, a fiercely independent French-Canadian woman who meets a Danish immigrant named Olsen (Mortensen). Far from a spoiler (as this is how the story is structured), the picture opens with Vivienne on her deathbed, being tended to in her final moments by Olsen. As their relationship is told in flashback, the painful truth of its outcome haunts every frame. While there is a certain melancholy, Vivienne and Olsen’s time together is beautifully constructed. Their coupling is colored with a supreme tenderness, as they both respond to and respect the independent nature within one another. This is not the story of a rugged cowboy protecting his frontier wife, but a film of connection and partnership of equals. Though the chapters of their life together is recollection, a linear path leads us through the beginnings of their strong foundation.

Vivenne’s tough, resilient spirit is put to the test when Olsen heeds the call to join the Union army and fight in the Civil War. Vivienne worries that he will never return, as the same fate befell her father when he went off to fight the British.

After building a home that is isolated miles from the town of Elk Flats, Nevada, Olsen rides off to war, leaving Vivienne alone and the unwilling prey of the film’s villain, Weston Jefferies (a menacing Solly McLeod). Weston sets his lecherous gaze upon Vivienne after she takes a job working at the town saloon owned by his father, the corrupt Alfred Jefferies (Garret Dillahunt). Vivienne stands firm in sidestepping his insults and advances, until Weston shows up at her door late one night; the course of Vivenne and Olsen’s future, forever changed.

When Olsen returns after five years, the repercussions of his time away are disarmingly potent. Mortensen crafts Olsen’s reaction to them with an effectiveness that gives strength to the authentic and unbreakable bond his character shares with Vivienne.

Becoming town sheriff, Olsen will denounce his appointment after having his fill of injustice. The  mayor (Danny Huston) helps Alfred Jeffries frame an innocent man for a saloon massacre committed by Alfred’s psychotic son. After Vivienne’s death, Olsen turns in his badge and heads out on a journey that reveals itself to be as surprising as it is deeply moving.