MOVIE · 1991

My Own Private Idaho

AdventureDrama104 min

Mike Waters is a Portland street hustler whose narcolepsy can drop him to the pavement without warning. River Phoenix is Mike, moving through a world of tricks, drugs, and constant uncertainty, while Keanu Reeves’s Scott Favor carries himself with the freedom of someone buffered by money and a powerful father. As the two travel from Oregon to Idaho and then to Italy in search of Mike’s estranged mother, their friendship keeps shifting, pulled between loyalty, need, and Mike’s feelings for Scott. Gus Van Sant frames the story as a road movie shaped by street life, longing, and a loose echo of Shakespeare.