River Phoenix's Last Film Before his Death "Dark Blood" Finally Completed

River Phoenix's last film before his death is complete, reported Reuters.

The "Dark Blood" star had 10 more days of shooting but died suddenly of a drug overdose at the age of 23.

Director George Sluizer closed the gaps in the film with voice overs. Phoenix played a troubled young widower named Boy who saves a wealthy couple named Harry and Buffy, played by Jonathan Pryce and Judy Davis, respectively.

At first, the couple is relieved at the rescue, but things get dark when Boy brings them into a dark canyon and not a nearby town. 

Pryce was astonished by Phoenix's death. At the film's Berlin screening, Pryce told reporters he was a "a kind of old head on young shoulders."

"In all the weeks we were together in Utah ... at no time did I experience him using drugs or abusing drugs in any way, shape or form," he said. "I'm not a drug user myself but I'd have known. It was a time in his life when he was very committed to not using drugs. I loved him a lot and I love his memory."

The film was going to be disposed in 1999 of after the movie was deemed incomplete by insurers, but Sluizer picked them up from Los Angeles before it was too late, according to Reuters. 

In 2007, he picked up where he left off and started putting the film together by rewriting the script to match the video he had.

"I chose him because I wanted a contrast between what was known about ... him, what he looked like, with this kind of weird, a little bit mad character," Sluizer said.