A Rich Man

"All I ever wanted was a new truck." - Woody Grant (Bruce Dern)


Woody Grant lives in his modest home in Billings, Montana with his cantankerous wife June, yet you'd hardly call his time spent there a life - existence is more like it. He seems as though he has nothing to live for, but one day, he receives a document in the mail stating that he has been selected as the winner of one million dollars. This is one of those phony gimmicks by a clearing house to get people to buy magazine subscriptions, but Woody doesn't see that; all he knows is that he has to get to Lincoln, Nebraska to claim his prize and he'll get there, come hell or high water.

That's the plot device that sets Nebraska - a moving, endearing, whimsical and introspective film - in motion. Grant, in his mid-70s, knows he has to make this journey before his time runs out. It's just that his wife as well as his two sons David and Ross do everything they can to persuade him not to make the trip, as they know that there is no prize money for Woody. But given his stubbornness, he won't or can't see the truth, so Will finally agrees to drive him to Lincoln, if only to get him out of the house and stop driving his wife crazy.

As directed by Alexander Payne (About Schmidt, Sideways, The Descendants) and written by Bob Nelson along with the unforgettable visuals provided by director of photography Phedon Papamichael, Nebraska is a look at the heartland of our country, as well as the meaning of love among family members as well as lifelong friends. The one million dollars that is supposedly out there is the MacGuffin that makes people do some strange things. When David (Will Forte) decides to drive Woody (Bruce Dern) to Lincoln, he makes plans to stop along the way in Hawthorne, Nebraska, a small town where Woody grew up. This section of the film represents the meat and bones of the story, as we get to know the more about father and son as well as the townspeople and how they react to Woody, as they learn of his supposed good fortune.

During this adventure, Woody sees a tavern and decides to sit down and have a beer; David sits with him, but orders a soda, telling his father he doesn't much care for alcohol. "Come on, have a beer with your old man," says Woody. "Be somebody." David does and it's during this scene that we start to learn of the true relationship of father and son. Is the father proud of the son? Is the son embarrassed by the father? In a film filled with many moments of lovely observations about human flaws, this scene is one the most revealing.

As Woody, Bruce Dern is mesmerizing; it's been a long time since he's been given such a meaty role (Coming Home, 1978) and he handles it with a great understanding of who this character is. With a head full of unruly hair going every which way and a frazzled white beard combined with his deliberate, slightly off kilt walk, he just looks and feels old. We wonder about the sanity of such a trip and at times, it seems this quest may just about kill him. But for Woody, it's about making things right, whether that means arriving in Lincoln to claim his prize or settling the score with an old crony, Ed Pegram (beautifully played by Stacy Keach). Dern is pitch perfect here; how nice to see this veteran actor finally get a chance to shine like never before.

Woody's wife Kate (June Squibb) is a memorable character, one who is going a bit awry trying to deal with Woody's unpredictable behavior. She makes no bones about what she'd like to see happen and is as direct in her feelings about her husband's condition as she is about her former lovers (there is a hilarious scene in a cemetery where she talks to the deceased in very frank terms about her body). Squibb, who had a small role in Payne's About Schmidt, has the time of her life with this role, yet she never overplays her hand; her performance lends a nice mix of bitterness and warmth to this film.

As mentioned previously, Papamichael's photography is a major strength of this film. At time beautiful (landscape images of cattle grazing in vast fields, cars moving along on interstates) and at times bleak (the scene where Woody and Will search for Woody's teeth along some railroad tracks is particularly arresting, as are the visuals of the near-empty streets of Hawthorne), the black and white images are ideal for the wistful mood of Nebraska. I think it's great that Payne had the courage to make a black and white film; his trust in Papamichael to deliver the proper visual emotions have been greatly rewarded.

I've admired Alexander Payne's films for many years now, especially the way his stories have such a nice mix of sweet and sour (often more the latter than the former). Nebraska to me is his finest work, both visually and organically. His world view - in this case a few small towns and their unique inhabitants and their dreams - has never been so fully realized and I've never been quite as delighted with the final product as I was when Nebraska came to its lovely conclusion.

For all of us who realize that becoming rich is more than just having enough money in the bank, Nebraska is a must see.

Nice, but a bit too tidy

What we have with The Descendants is a kinder, gentler Alexander Payne. The writer/director who gave us such films as About Schmidt (2002) and Sideways (2004), delivers a film that is less cynical about its main characters than much of his previous work. It's a good movie with a few beautifully honest moments, but in the final analysis, it's a bit too nice and tidy and just doesn't hold up as well compared with his previous efforts.

The story itself is a serious one; that of a successful lawyer named Matt King (George Clooney), who has been given the task of selling a family trust of thousands of acres of prime native Hawaiian land that some of his relatives and he have inherited. Due to a law that prohibits ownership in perpetuity, they have only seven years left to decide who to sell the land to, be it a local group or out-of-town developers. 

It's a big task and it keeps Matt knee deep in paperwork and meetings. But that pales in comparison to his most serious concern; his wife was seriously injured in a boating accident and is in a coma at the local hospital. It isn't long before Matt learns that there is no hope for his wife, so he must take care of this business as well as the real estate sale and perhaps most importantly, break the news to his two daughters, 17-year old Alexandra (Shailene Woodley) and 10-year old Scottie (Amara Miller).

This is of course, a difficult and slightly clumsy challenge for Matt, but it becomes more complicated when he learns a fact about his wife that his oldest daughter knew, but had not previously shared with her father. Matt is floored by this news (I won't give this plot detail away), something that affects both him personally and as it soon turns out, could alter his business plans as far as the land sale.

What I like about this film is the way that Matt deals with his daughters. The dialogue (by Nat Faxon, Jim Rash and Payne, based on a novel by Kaui Hart Hemmings) is smart and realistic; this is a far more accurate depiction of how young girls talk than a film such as Juno, for example. It's the same on other levels as well, as when Matt goes to his neighbors for advice with his problems. There are a lot of clumsy moments that nicely reflect the awkward moments in our life.

Clooney, who is in every scene in this film, is the glue that holds this story together and he's more than up to the challenge. He deep voice confirms a sense of calm, even when things are going haywire. He's even more effective however, when he doesn't speak- his focus sharpens and his face tightens, as you know he wants to say something, but doesn't. This is especially true in the scenes with Robert Forster, who portrays Clooney's father-in-law, who blames Matt for the accident that gravely injured his daughter.

The scenes that Clooney and Forster share - one at Forster's home and one at the hospital - are the best moments in this film. There's an anger that pervades Forster's vision, as he doesn't know all the facts. Clooney could tell him everything, but doesn't, if only for not wanting an even bigger conflict on his hands. The screenplay at these moments asks us, "how much is enough?"- are there indeed secrets that are not worth sharing, even if divulging those secrets can ease our pain?

This overriding message is the one that makes The Descendants a successful film. It is a strong enough point to outweigh some of the pat situations here, as I feel that things are wrapped up a bit too tidy with this film. A few more serious questions could have been asked and I believe this would have been a better film for it. Dealing with the death of a loved one is a somber challenge to anyone and this is a good look at the subject, but except for the scenes with Forster, there isn't the bite to this film that you expect. Payne gave us some pretty cynical characters in his previous works and for me, these characters added a lot of depth to those stories, which dealt with a number of crazy- and sad - moments in the human condition. I prefer the old Payne and hope he returns to that vision in his future works. But for now, The Descendants will have to do.

Life Through Letters

About Schmidt (2002, Alexander Payne) generally received very good to excellent reviews for its offbeat look at a newly retired actuary who makes a trip from his home in Omaha, Nebraska to see his daughter get married in Denver. The title character, portrayed by Jack Nicholson in one of his most atypical performances, doesn’t much care for his new son-in-law, but he does the proper thing and shows up for the ceremonies (though he pleads with his daughter not to marry her fiancé just a few days before the wedding).

There were some reviewers who thought that the screenplay co-authored by Payne and Jim Taylor took some cheap shots at some characters and felt the film was a bit cruel. I don’t agree with those critics, but I do see their point.

What I’d like to discusss is the film’s message of life as it is really lived versus life as it is lived out in documents, whether in business memos or on computer screens. Schmidt was an actuary, hardly an exciting profession, and life for him revolved around statistics, cold numbers. We find out that he wanted to open his own business and had dreams of being famous and rich, but these plans never materialized; thus he worked for the same company for years. As we learn in the opening scene, when we see him wait until the clock on the wall of his drab office turns 5:00 on the dot until he leaves (presumably on his final day at work), this was not an enthralling job.

Soon after his retirement party (a wonderful scene set in a typically hokey Wild West-themed banquet room), he sees an commercial on television for a program where the public can send $22 a month to help out underpriviliged children in Africa. Intrigued and at the same time, wanting to put something new in his boring life, he decides to send money.

He receives acknowledgement of his charity and is told in a letter that any sort of personal communication along with the monetary gift would be appreciated. Schmidt decides then and there that he will write letters to the young boy named Ndugu that he is sponsoring. But instead of simple letters to a six-year old boy in Africa, he is determined to let the boy in on the inner workings of his life.

What I love about this angle is the fact that Schmidt pours his heart into these letters. It’s clear after seeing a few scenes with his wife that their marriage had become stale. He even writes at one point, “Who is this old woman who lives in my house?” We can assume that he didn’t have many meaningful conversations with his wife during recent years, yet he relishes the chance to write all of his complaints about his wife to Ndugu. (These complaints ranged from everything about her wasting their money on her hobbies to how she would take her keys out of her purse well before she got to the car – how this annoyed him!)

It’s clear that written words mean so much to Schmidt now, just as the cold, hard statistics of his former job were the most important thing in his life. When he complains about how his wife smells, you know that he was not exactly a warm, compassionate human being. When he gets into his list of complaints about his wife, who could he tell? No one in his small circle of friends in Omaha, that’s for certain. But when it comes to letters to a six-year old in Africa, he can share his most inner thoughts.

This isn’t exactly mature on his part, but he obviously has been keeping this inside of him for a long time and now has the opportunity to let go with the truth. It’s safe to assume that when he’s tried to be truthful with the loved ones in his life, he failed miserably, so he has to do it through letters and not through actions. When he asks his daughter not to marry her fiancé, as he believes he doesn’t measure up (he’s a water bed salesman), his daughter wonders why he cares about her now, especially as he took such little interest in her life as she grew up. It’s clear she only asks him to the wedding as it’s the proper thing to do – he has to give her away at the ceremony – but she’d probably feel fine if she didn’t have to deal with him. He feels the same way; it’s clear his attention for years was with his work – the cold figures on a compter screen or in reports – that he dealt with on a regular basis. Having to deal with the problems of his daughter was something he couldn’t handle.

The final scene in which he looks at a simple stick-figure illustration of an adult and a child holding hands under a bright blue sky on a sunny day is a brilliant way of closing this film and bringing home the message of dealing with your emotions through actions and not words. Schmidt cries as he glances at this drawing created by Ndugu as a gift to him. (What is especially touching is this happens after he writes Ndugu that he – Schmidt – has been a failure, that he has been weak).

The beauty and simplicity of this portrayal – how two people living thousands of miles away can share a friendship – is overwhelming to him. Fittingly, the message of optimism and hope come to him in a document. Perhaps at last, Schmidt can deal with people in his life through concern and brotherly love.