127 Hours
Fox Searchlight Pictures | Release Date: November 5, 2010
8.1
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Universal acclaim based on 722 Ratings
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10
MattBrady99Mar 13, 2015
Aron Ralston: "I'm in pretty deep doodoo here."

The story is about a mountain climber becomes trapped under a boulder in a remote area near Moab, Utah, he must resort to extreme measures in order to survive. Danny Boyle once againAron Ralston: "I'm in pretty deep doodoo here."

The story is about a mountain climber becomes trapped under a boulder in a remote area near Moab, Utah, he must resort to extreme measures in order to survive.

Danny Boyle once again proves that he is a fantastic director in this movie. The way he shots and show the trouble that are main character goes through, it's truly great. The cinematography in this movie took the wind out of me it's that brilliant. This is James Franco best role I've seen him. He made me care about his character and he almost made my cry a little a bit.

My only nick picks with the film are the goofy scenes with the Scooby-Doo scene. I'm sorry but that scene came out of no where and lost the serious of the movie for me, and I no his seeing things because his losing a lot of blood and he's in a tight space, but still you can't help to ask "What the hell was all that about?".

127 hours is a excellent film with mind blowing camera work and one of the best directing I've seen since Spielberg.… Expand
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8
Berry-TanJan 12, 2016
127 Hours asks a big question of its audience: could you do what Aron Ralston does when it came down to it?
It's chilling, claustrophobic, even nerve-racking, but it's also one of the most fascinating films of the year. You'll feel like127 Hours asks a big question of its audience: could you do what Aron Ralston does when it came down to it?
It's chilling, claustrophobic, even nerve-racking, but it's also one of the most fascinating films of the year. You'll feel like you're clenching everything in your body as this movie builds towards its inevitable climax, but this is a masterful work...… Expand
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9
TheFilmDoctorMar 22, 2016
Danny Boyle has taken us to the surface of the sun (“Sunshine”) and the end of the world as we know it (“28 Days Later”), testing the limits of human endurance with each radically different project. “127 Hours” takes the adrenaline rush oneDanny Boyle has taken us to the surface of the sun (“Sunshine”) and the end of the world as we know it (“28 Days Later”), testing the limits of human endurance with each radically different project. “127 Hours” takes the adrenaline rush one step further, pitting man against nature in the most elemental of struggles as Boyle compresses the true story of rock-climbing junkie Aron Ralston, who spent five days wrestling with a boulder after a rockslide pinned his arm against a canyon wall, into an intense 93 minutes. Marketed correctly, pic should spell another hit for the high-energy helmer.

On paper, “127 Hours” would seem to buck convention on multiple fronts: The film revolves around a single actor (James Franco) stuck in one location (“Between a Rock and a Hard Place,” to borrow the title of Ralston’s memoir) for most of its running time, and though it packs an uplifting ending, that emotional victory comes at the expense of the hero’s right arm — depicted in a gruesome climax that caused a number of people to faint at the film’s premiere in Telluride (located just three hours from Bluejohn Canyon, Utah, where the events took place).

Blatantly noncommercial elements aside, Boyle and co-writer Simon Beaufoy (“Slumdog Millionaire”) have managed to craft quite an accessible film after all, opening up the action with a sexy prologue featuring two lost hikers (Kate Mara and Amber Tamblyn, whose carefree early scenes would feel right at home in Boyle’s “The Beach”) and using several hallucinatory visions drawn directly from Ralston’s book, all the better to re-create his frame of mind at the time — a task that relies on two cinematographers, Anthony Dod Mantle and Enrique Chediak, to achieve the film’s gorgeous supersaturated look.

While Franco can sometimes be a wild card, getting increasingly self-conscious with recent roles (most notably his guest-starring stunt on “General Hospital”), his take on Ralston feels both credible and compelling; few actors could have made us care so much, or disappeared so completely into the role. With very little time to establish the young man’s backstory, Franco uses his Method acting technique to slip into Ralston’s skin, making it that much easier for us to vicariously do the same. We “get” him instantly, thanks in part to an energetic opening montage, spread across three rapidly changing screens and cut to Free Blood’s “Never Hear Surf Music Again,” that places the young engineering student’s interest in the outdoors within the broader American phenomenon of extreme sports. Ralston may be rather reckless, flipping his bike and so forth on his way to the canyon, but he knows what he’s doing, and the accident wasn’t necessarily his fault: While he was testing his weight on a loose chockstone, the rock gave way and crushed him beneath it.

Over the course of the next hour, Ralston will cycle through all five stages of grief (with “acceptance” ultimately being the decision to remove his arm), while making room for some serious soul-searching. Ralston replays memories of his family, an intimate night shared with g.f. Megan (Clemence Poesy) and his eventual breakup — all serving to interrupt the monotony of dehydration and helplessness. As the days pass, his visions become more vivid and abstract — one day he hosts an unsettling gameshow-like monologue with himself, complete with laugh track, the next he dreams of a harrowing flash flood — before culminating in a fateful premonition.

Just as director Rodrigo Cortes did in the recent stuck-in-a-coffin thriller “Buried,” Boyle constantly repositions the camera to help dispel the potential claustrophobia of it all, sometimes pulling weird trick shots (such as the straw’s-eye view of Ralston’s dwindling water supply). Since the real Ralston brought a camcorder along on the hike, the film treats some of the footage as if the character were documenting the situation himself, letting the writers get away with a fair amount of explanatory dialogue, along with the occasional tension-breaking one-liner.

As nerve-racking as the whole predicament is, it’s surprising how much humor manages to sneak in, with A.R. Rahman’s Western-sounding synthpop score building from tension to ultimate triumph (with a boost from the original Dido collaboration “If I Rise”). Many will come out of sheer curiosity about Ralston’s self-administered amputation (whether or not they manage to keep their eyes open during the scene itself), but the scenes that follow are even more effective, right up to the closing images of the real Ralston, still chasing the adrenaline dream.… Expand
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8
DoctorFilmMar 30, 2016
Danny Boyle has taken us to the surface of the sun (“Sunshine”) and the end of the world as we know it (“28 Days Later”), testing the limits of human endurance with each radically different project. “127 Hours” takes the adrenaline rush oneDanny Boyle has taken us to the surface of the sun (“Sunshine”) and the end of the world as we know it (“28 Days Later”), testing the limits of human endurance with each radically different project. “127 Hours” takes the adrenaline rush one step further, pitting man against nature in the most elemental of struggles as Boyle compresses the true story of rock-climbing junkie Aron Ralston, who spent five days wrestling with a boulder after a rockslide pinned his arm against a canyon wall, into an intense 93 minutes.

single actor (James Franco) stuck in one location (“Between a Rock and a Hard Place,” to borrow the title of Ralston’s memoir) for most of its running time, and though it packs an uplifting ending, that emotional victory comes at the expense of the hero’s right arm — depicted in a gruesome climax that caused a number of people to faint at the film’s premiere in Telluride (located just three hours from Bluejohn Canyon, Utah, where the events took place).

Blatantly noncommercial elements aside, Boyle and co-writer Simon Beaufoy (“Slumdog Millionaire”) have managed to craft quite an accessible film after all, opening up the action with a sexy prologue featuring two lost hikers (Kate Mara and Amber Tamblyn, whose carefree early scenes would feel right at home in Boyle’s “The Beach”) and using several hallucinatory visions drawn directly from Ralston’s book, all the better to re-create his frame of mind at the time — a task that relies on two cinematographers, Anthony Dod Mantle and Enrique Chediak, to achieve the film’s gorgeous supersaturated look.

While Franco can sometimes be a wild card, getting increasingly self-conscious with recent roles (most notably his guest-starring stunt on “General Hospital”), his take on Ralston feels both credible and compelling; few actors could have made us care so much, or disappeared so completely into the role. With very little time to establish the young man’s backstory, Franco uses his Method acting technique to slip into Ralston’s skin, making it that much easier for us to vicariously do the same. We “get” him instantly, thanks in part to an energetic opening montage, spread across three rapidly changing screens and cut to Free Blood’s “Never Hear Surf Music Again,” that places the young engineering student’s interest in the outdoors within the broader American phenomenon of extreme sports. Ralston may be rather reckless, flipping his bike and so forth on his way to the canyon, but he knows what he’s doing, and the accident wasn’t necessarily his fault: While he was testing his weight on a loose chockstone, the rock gave way and crushed him beneath it.

Over the course of the next hour, Ralston will cycle through all five stages of grief (with “acceptance” ultimately being the decision to remove his arm), while making room for some serious soul-searching. Ralston replays memories of his family, an intimate night shared with g.f. Megan (Clemence Poesy) and his eventual breakup — all serving to interrupt the monotony of dehydration and helplessness. As the days pass, his visions become more vivid and abstract — one day he hosts an unsettling gameshow-like monologue with himself, complete with laugh track, the next he dreams of a harrowing flash flood — before culminating in a fateful premonition.

Just as director Rodrigo Cortes did in the recent stuck-in-a-coffin thriller “Buried,” Boyle constantly repositions the camera to help dispel the potential claustrophobia of it all, sometimes pulling weird trick shots (such as the straw’s-eye view of Ralston’s dwindling water supply). Since the real Ralston brought a camcorder along on the hike, the film treats some of the footage as if the character were documenting the situation himself, letting the writers get away with a fair amount of explanatory dialogue, along with the occasional tension-breaking one-liner.

As nerve-racking as the whole predicament is, it’s surprising how much humor manages to sneak in, with A.R. Rahman’s Western-sounding synthpop score building from tension to ultimate triumph (with a boost from the original Dido collaboration “If I Rise”). Many will come out of sheer curiosity about Ralston’s self-administered amputation (whether or not they manage to keep their eyes open during the scene itself), but the scenes that follow are even more effective, right up to the closing images of the real Ralston, still chasing the adrenaline dream.… Expand
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8
MovieMasterEddyApr 3, 2016
Danny Boyle has taken us to the surface of the sun (“Sunshine”) and the end of the world as we know it (“28 Days Later”), testing the limits of human endurance with each radically different project. “127 Hours” takes the adrenaline rush oneDanny Boyle has taken us to the surface of the sun (“Sunshine”) and the end of the world as we know it (“28 Days Later”), testing the limits of human endurance with each radically different project. “127 Hours” takes the adrenaline rush one step further, pitting man against nature in the most elemental of struggles as Boyle compresses the true story of rock-climbing junkie Aron Ralston, who spent five days wrestling with a boulder after a rockslide pinned his arm against a canyon wall, into an intense 93 minutes.

On paper, “127 Hours” would seem to buck convention on multiple fronts: The film revolves around a single actor (James Franco) stuck in one location (“Between a Rock and a Hard Place,” to borrow the title of Ralston’s memoir) for most of its running time, and though it packs an uplifting ending, that emotional victory comes at the expense of the hero’s right arm — depicted in a gruesome climax that caused a number of people to faint at the film’s premiere in Telluride (located just three hours from Bluejohn Canyon, Utah, where the events took place).

Blatantly noncommercial elements aside, Boyle and co-writer Simon Beaufoy (“Slumdog Millionaire”) have managed to craft quite an accessible film after all, opening up the action with a sexy prologue featuring two lost hikers (Kate Mara and Amber Tamblyn, whose carefree early scenes would feel right at home in Boyle’s “The Beach”) and using several hallucinatory visions drawn directly from Ralston’s book, all the better to re-create his frame of mind at the time — a task that relies on two cinematographers, Anthony Dod Mantle and Enrique Chediak, to achieve the film’s gorgeous supersaturated look.

While Franco can sometimes be a wild card, getting increasingly self-conscious with recent roles (most notably his guest-starring stunt on “General Hospital”), his take on Ralston feels both credible and compelling; few actors could have made us care so much, or disappeared so completely into the role. With very little time to establish the young man’s backstory, Franco uses his Method acting technique to slip into Ralston’s skin, making it that much easier for us to vicariously do the same. We “get” him instantly, thanks in part to an energetic opening montage, spread across three rapidly changing screens and cut to Free Blood’s “Never Hear Surf Music Again,” that places the young engineering student’s interest in the outdoors within the broader American phenomenon of extreme sports. Ralston may be rather reckless, flipping his bike and so forth on his way to the canyon, but he knows what he’s doing, and the accident wasn’t necessarily his fault: While he was testing his weight on a loose chockstone, the rock gave way and crushed him beneath it.

Over the course of the next hour, Ralston will cycle through all five stages of grief (with “acceptance” ultimately being the decision to remove his arm), while making room for some serious soul-searching. Ralston replays memories of his family, an intimate night shared with g.f. Megan (Clemence Poesy) and his eventual breakup — all serving to interrupt the monotony of dehydration and helplessness. As the days pass, his visions become more vivid and abstract — one day he hosts an unsettling gameshow-like monologue with himself, complete with laugh track, the next he dreams of a harrowing flash flood — before culminating in a fateful premonition.

Just as director Rodrigo Cortes did in the recent stuck-in-a-coffin thriller “Buried,” Boyle constantly repositions the camera to help dispel the potential claustrophobia of it all, sometimes pulling weird trick shots (such as the straw’s-eye view of Ralston’s dwindling water supply). Since the real Ralston brought a camcorder along on the hike, the film treats some of the footage as if the character were documenting the situation himself, letting the writers get away with a fair amount of explanatory dialogue, along with the occasional tension-breaking one-liner.

As nerve-racking as the whole predicament is, it’s surprising how much humor manages to sneak in, with A.R. Rahman’s Western-sounding synthpop score building from tension to ultimate triumph (with a boost from the original Dido collaboration “If I Rise”). Many will come out of sheer curiosity about Ralston’s self-administered amputation (whether or not they manage to keep their eyes open during the scene itself), but the scenes that follow are even more effective, right up to the closing images of the real Ralston, still chasing the adrenaline dream.… Expand
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9
Muskrat147Jul 15, 2016
Well paced, tensely directed, and wonderfully acted, 127 Hours makes the most out of its confined setting, and uses James Franco's one-of-a-kind performance to deliver a unique survival story.
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8
TheArchetypesSep 9, 2016
Surely one of the best films of the year, Boyle's effort I believe is a triumphant and revolutionary new take in film of a person that is in complete solitude, an upbeat soundtrack and by blending fear, tension, and humour all into one. ISurely one of the best films of the year, Boyle's effort I believe is a triumphant and revolutionary new take in film of a person that is in complete solitude, an upbeat soundtrack and by blending fear, tension, and humour all into one. I think that probably what is the most moving though is that this film is able to take hold of you and when you're let go in the end; the only thing you can think of is that you are just glad to be alive.… Expand
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7
eriflynnNov 20, 2017
Maybe is not one of the most exasperating movies, but the feeling is there. James Franco represent very well the desesperation of the character. A history of how a person trying to survive at any cost is well represented with the direction.Maybe is not one of the most exasperating movies, but the feeling is there. James Franco represent very well the desesperation of the character. A history of how a person trying to survive at any cost is well represented with the direction. The orange tones of the photography make me feel the loneliness of the principal character Aaron Ralston.… Expand
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8
DomgwyDec 20, 2017
(Insert missing arm joke here)

So what do you do when you’ve just won eight oscars with a film that could just as easily have gone straight to DVD? Cash in and direct the latest Spielberg/Michael Bay produced blockbuster? Make a nice, easy(Insert missing arm joke here)

So what do you do when you’ve just won eight oscars with a film that could just as easily have gone straight to DVD? Cash in and direct the latest Spielberg/Michael Bay produced blockbuster? Make a nice, easy rom-com? Take some time off? Well if your Danny Boyle the answer is ‘none of the above, I’m going to make a film about a man trapped in a hole on his own for six days’.

Truth be told, it’s a hard sell and it could be argued that were it not for Boyle the film would not receive the attention and wide theatrical release it has done, despite it’s subject matter.

127 Hours tells the true story of Aron Ralston, an amateur rock climber who, in 2003, became famous when he was forced to cut off his forearm having been trapped by a boulder for almost six days.

The media attention surrounding the story at the time, along with Ralston’s own recounting of his ordeal in his book Between a Rock and A Hard Place, presents Boyle with yet another obstacle — how do you engage an audience who (for the most part) will already know the story?

Well from the first frame it’s clear Boyle is taking us for another roller-coaster ride. The opening of the film grabs the audience just as Iggy Pop and Ewan McGregor did in Boyle’s seminal Trainspotting. This time however the director employs split screens to bombard the viewer with images, images of us, the 21st century western audience in our masses, going to and from work, to sports events to play the stock markets. Into this confusion and chaos we are introduced to Aron (James Franco) a happy go lucky young engineer making ready for a weekend trip into the wilderness, ignoring the phone as it rings in the background and getting his gear together.

In this opening sequence Boyle has successfully brought us in to his film in a strikingly visual and aural attack on the senses which can almost be seen as a directional trade mark (28 Days Later, Sunshine).

From here on in the focus is squarely on Franco who delivers a truly remarkable performance. The most striking aspect of the performance however is just how subtle and measured it is even in the most emotionally challenging scenes. It’s Aron’s matter-of-fact delivery and quiet despair that come across and ultimately involves the audience, not as I had expected going in, an intense Bale-esque inner turmoil punctuated by dramatic outbursts.

Aaron’s claustrophobia is shared by the audience after the accident. Boyle depicts a sense of freedom in Aron’s early scenes in the wilderness both physically and socially as he meets two young women. It is this freedom and social interaction that we crave along with Aron throughout the bulk of the film as we are trapped with him. Despite various flashbacks and fantasies, everything onscreen after the first thirty minutes can be seen to take place either in the cave or within Aron’s mind.

The psychological journey undertaken by Aron is what the film is really ‘about’. Through the deepest despair we see Aron gain acceptance that his choice of individualist lifestyle is what ultimately led him to his predicament, if he had just told someone where he was going or invited a friend he could have saved himself. Here in lies the fundamental question of the piece that goes beyond the much debated ‘could you cut your own arm off?’ : should we choose to give up our own individual freedom and join the rat-race depicted earlier, or do we choose to keep our freedom and accept the risks of living outside the mainstream?

Which brings us to the infamous liberation scene, during which Aron cuts off his own arm. Boyle doesn’t pull any punches and it’s safe to say the scene plays out with graphic detail. To me however, it is the sound design of the scene and one particular effect which made me most uncomfortable. Is it necessary to provide this much detail? I believe it is, Aron has been presented as a man who is specific, who sets targets and thinks with a rational, mathematical mind and throughout the film Boyle reflects this is his visual style, concentrating on minute details, to cut away now and not show the audience the event in detail, would be a betrayal.

Danny Boyle has delivered a bold piece of film making which along with a superb score by Slumdog maestro A R Rahman and a riveting performance by James Franco makes 127 Hours a truly cinematic experience. Not bad for a film about a man trapped down a hole, all we need now is for Danny to adapt the story of the Chilean miners onto the big screen.… Expand
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7
FilipeNetoFeb 16, 2018
A great survival story

This film, with direction and script by Danny Boyle, tells the story of Aron Ralston, an adventurer who gets trapped in a canyon after a heavy rock crushing his hand. Based on real facts, written by true Ralston in hisA great survival story

This film, with direction and script by Danny Boyle, tells the story of Aron Ralston, an adventurer who gets trapped in a canyon after a heavy rock crushing his hand. Based on real facts, written by true Ralston in his book "Between a Rock and a Hard Place", this film deals with the theme of survival and loneliness, trying to show how far can a man go when he's alone and needs to survive. Featuring James Franco as protagonist.

Its an intense film, where the audience is clinging to several attempts that the character does to get rid of the situation, potentially fatal, which inadvertently ended. However, the absence of a larger plot (only broken by mental flashbacks that show us the character's thoughts) ends up making this movie too stopped, and it would be a bit boring if not for the extraordinary soundtrack and the sense of danger that surrounds all action, since the moment Ralston falls into the gully. The interpretation of Franco is very good: the actor managed to give his character the psychological aspect of a man in utter despair. For all this, the film was nominated for six Oscars (Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Film Editing, Best Original Score and Best Original Song for the song "If I Rise") and three Golden Globes (Best Dramatic Actor, Best Film Screenplay and Best Original Score).… Expand
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7
FairbottomMay 24, 2018
This is the harrowing tale of a man stuck between a rock and another rock. The full force of this man's situatedness between rocks can be captured in a single viewing. Nevertheless, this film will surely compete for pride of place in theThis is the harrowing tale of a man stuck between a rock and another rock. The full force of this man's situatedness between rocks can be captured in a single viewing. Nevertheless, this film will surely compete for pride of place in the betwixt-rocks genre of dramatic cinema.… Expand
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7
JeBjBoJan 14, 2023
great performance, clever directing and THAT scene everyone was talking about 2010
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8
ThejodjeremieOct 23, 2020
I love the movie because it shows even in a bad situation, you should try to keep going.
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10
Amirhosein2005May 12, 2021
This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. A film based on a deadly tragedy for a young rock climber who has to cut off his hand to survive is truly epic! The acting of James Franco, directed by Danny Boyle and the soundtrack are fantastic.… Expand
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9
PhytomJan 22, 2023
This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. An awesome, thrilling movie that really makes you empathize with the character. Perfect cinematography when he cuts off his arm.… Expand
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