Captain Fantastic

Viggo Mortensen plays the father-gone-primitive in this wonderful award-winning comedy about an off-grid family.

Viggo Mortensen shines in a rare comic lead as the paterfamilias of a radical clan, eking out an alternative existence outside of regular society. Completely off-grid in a remote forest in the Pacific Northwest, the Cash family hunt wild animals for food and eschew all contact with the outside world. But an unexpected family development finds them reconnecting with both American society and an extended family they’d tried to avoid.

Debuting at Sundance Film Festival in 2016, Captain Fantastic has gone on to achieve critical acclaim and a number of top festival awards, including an Un Certain Regard prize for director Matt Ross at Cannes Film Festival. Combining canny comedy with touching drama, Ross’ thought-provoking fable prods and teases out notions of 21st-century idealism and materialism. But as its heart this is a film about family and the perils of parenthood; a fertile theme for the best in US indie cinema from Little Miss Sunshine though to When We Were Young and Maggie’s Plan.