Promised Land

First Hit:  A film with a message about change in the United States.

How long will small towns survive in the United States, especially when work has gone wanting? How will they feed their families, send their children to college, and continue the life that was once mostly farming.

Steve Butler (played by Matt Damon) comes from one of those towns and he saw how his family lost their home and farm. He works for “Global” which leases farms where there are natural gas deposits, by giving the farmer a financial down payment and part of the profits from the gas they extract from the property.

The issue is that the system they use is called “fracking” which uses water and chemicals in their drilling to break up the shale and release the natural gas trapped in the shale. Problem is that it can contaminate the groundwater.

Steve is excellent at getting people to sign these leases because he’s honest and believes in giving people another option for their land. He's been through it and therefore believes in what his is doing. His co-worker, Sue Thompson (played by Frances McDormand), is his partner and is good at selling the leases. During the “selling” of the townsfolk in a community meeting at the gym, one of their townsfolk Frank Yates (played by Hal Holbrook) tells of the dangers of fracking. Steve indicates that there may be issues but Global takes the necessary precautions.

Then there is Dustin (played by John Krasinski) who rides into town in a light green truck representing Athena Environmental Group. He pushes for the townsfolk to vote against Global. It becomes a battle of wills, the truth and what is right between Dustin and Steve.

The battle is about the use of fracking and Alice (played by Rosemarie DeWitt) a local, pretty and eligible school teacher.

Damon, as usual, is outstanding. He plays the earnest thoughtful man who is willing to learn more about himself, and does this better than any actor I’ve seen. McDormand is wonderful as the sidekick who also frets about how much time she is spending away from her son. Holbrook’s resurgence as an actor in film has been wonderful and this performance continues to show his fine abilities. DeWitt is good as the attractive kind woman that captures the heart of the lead. Titus Welliver (as a store owner) is fantastic as the amused and interesting store owner. John Krasinski and Matt Damon wrote a wonderful and thoughtful script. Gus Van Sant’s direction was very good and some of the shots are absolutely brilliant.

Overall:  This was a thoughtful film and continues to have me asking questions about what small towns will do as farming is being taken over by conglomerates and manufacturing is being moved offshore.

Water for Elephants

First Hit: One great performance in a mediocre film.

Jacob (played by Robert Pattinson) is a depression child (although his character didn’t experience it) following in his father’s footsteps as a Doctor of Veterinary Science.

We see him just about ready to take his final exam and the voice over tells us he’s going to have sex with someone in the class. Not sure why this is important except to say he’s ready to start his new life after the exam.

However, before he can put pencil to paper, he is called out of class and learns that his parents have just died in an auto accident. Settling their affairs, he finds out that the house is no longer his because his parents mortgaged it to pay for his schooling. He is, in fact, broke and homeless like the tens of thousands of others of this time period.

While walking down a railroad track a train comes so he hops it only to quickly find out that it is a traveling circus train. The circus is run by August (played by Christoph Waltz) who is married to the main attraction Marlena (played by Reese Witherspoon).

Her main act is to ride and demonstrate elegance and control over her horses in the center ring. She is far younger than her husband whom she met when he found her on the streets of a small town. She didn't know her parents and had lived in foster homes all her life. He offered her a different kind of life and home with a family of other societal misfits.

When Jacob meets Marlena she is working with her lead horse who has a leg problem. Jacob quickly diagnoses the ailing horse and takes the risk of putting it out of its misery. August both punishes and rewards Jacob for the efforts because the horse was the star attraction and he had enough conviction to do what was right.

To create a new crowd pleasing and money making act, August buys an elephant named Rosie. August tells Jacob that he is in-charge of Rosie and must train it to be the money making attraction the circus needs to stay in business. August tells him he needs this act to be great because, his circus will otherwise go bankrupt (like others of his time) and they will all perish. 

Jacob is kind in his training of Rosie but little progress is being made with the training, so August takes this task into his own hands by telling Jacob he must make Rosie know who is boss. August goes into Rosie’s rail car and beats the elephant bloody. This makes Marlena and Jacob sick, unites them in their cause to treat the elephant kindly, and also emotionally brings together as a couple.

I won’t share more of the story but to say that it has a Hollywood story type ending.

Pattinson is ill suited for this part. His moody (James Dean spin off) presence and good looks (to young girls that want to make his moodiness go away) may work for “The Twilight” series of films but here it is a distraction. Witherspoon, doesn’t fare much better. There isn’t much to make me believe her background and why she married August. The chemistry between Pattinson and Witherspoon was minimal and it showed in their scenes. Waltz was the star and the great performance of this film. From his opening scene, till the end he was a man of great contradictions of passion and manic anger. His whole face and especially his eyes kept me totally on edge in every scene thinking “how would this scene end?” When he is on the screen, he’s the one you watch. Hal Holbrook plays the senior Jacob and it is always great to see and hear his intelligent acting. Richard LaGravenese wrote the screenplay which was pretty good. Francis Lawrence directed this and leaving the theater it felt like a lot of great possibilities were left on the table.

Overall: This film was a great disappointment but might be OK to view on video with nothing else to do on a Sunday afternoon.

Into the Wild

First Hit: An amazing adventure which touched me in my adventurer’s spirit.

Emile Hirsch does an extraordinary job of capturing the spirit of Christopher McCandless.

It is at the end of the film when Director Sean Penn shows a real life picture of Christopher sitting in front of the bus where he spent more than 100 days do you see how well Emile captured Christopher’s spirit. Their smiles are one and come from that deep joyful place of adventure and spirit.

During the film I counted three times when Emile looks directly at the camera. One is very up front and obvious the other two times are more a little more subtle, however I think this helps to set off the photograph of McCandless at the very end of the film.

The narrative part of the film is handled in two ways: 1) The voice of Jena Malone, Christopher’s sister, and 2) The writings of Christopher which appear on the screen from time to time. Jena’s narration speaks of the family history in which she and Christopher were brought up in. This is an important key to this film and helps the audience understand part of the motivation.

I did find the film a little long; however I was entranced with the scenes with Hal Holbrook who just may receive an Oscar supporting nod for his role.

Overall: This was a very very good film and Sean Penn does an outstanding job with the screenplay and direction of Jon Krakauer’s book.