The Homesman

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Tommy Lee Jones/Starring: Hilary Swank, Tommy Lee Jones, John Lithgow, James Spader, Meryl Streep, Miranda Otto, Tim Blake Nelson, Grace Gummer, William Fichtner and Sonja Richter

One film that arrives without much fanfare is Tommy Lee Jones' The Homesman, which is too bad because a film so determined to depict the harsh and sometimes dangerous conditions awaiting those eking out a meager existence as farmers in post-Civil War America deserves closer examination. I came to Jones' film expecting costume-drama Oscar-bait but was impressed with the story's bleak, desolate, violent and powerful nature. This isn't Little House on the Prairie with girls in pigtails and farmers in suspenders and beards enjoying the fruits of their labor. Jones' film lets us know life for plains farmers was often dirty and muddy and death could be dispensed to them in many ugly and swift ways. If disease didn't claim one's life, being hanged or gunned down by one's fellow man were often effective, lethal surrogates.

Cast in this 19th century, Nebraskan milieu is Mary Bee Cuddy; a young woman tending her own farm and succeeding reasonably well. Cuddy is poignantly played by Hilary Swank, whose gaunt face and skeletal frame make her an ideal casting choice for a woman struggling to survive in an environment where deprivation is the norm. The film's opening shot is Mary guiding her mule-drawn plow through Nebraska soil. We see that she is an independent, determined, church-going woman who realizes survival and prosperity might be viable objectives if she had a man; preferably another farmer with whom to wed her fortune--as Mary might put it.

Mary invites a fellow farmer Bob Giffen (Evan Jones, in a brief but memorable role), to supper with the intention of asking for his hand in marriage. When Mary tries to entertain Bob with her singing, which she accompanies with a mock keyboard made of cloth, Bob nods off. After he awakens, Mary proposes marriage, which Bob responds to with alarm; citing her "plain as a tin pan" appearance as a reasonable pretext for refusal. Mary's marriage proposal is inspired more as a pragmatic solution than an act of passion.

While in the local church-house one day, the minuscule congregation discusses a problem confronting the community. Three farmer's wives, who have gone mad, are to be taken east to Iowa, where the Reverend's friend will receive the women before they are sent further eastward. While the men in the congregation balk at the idea, Mary's Christian compassion and duty, as well as her prowess with a gun, make her the best, if not the most desirable, candidate. She agrees to take on the mission; a formidable and time-consuming journey, not to mention dangerous.

In the film's early scenes, we meet the three women: Arabella Sours (Grace Gummer; Meryl Streep's daughter), whose madness comes on the heels of the deaths of her three children--all lost to diphtheria; Theoline Belknap (Miranda Otto), first seen in a trance-like state as an infant she holds to her breast is tossed horrifically into an outhouse hole; and Gro Svendsen (Sonja Richter), whose loss of her Swedish mother and her husband's callous disregard for her emotional well-being have robbed her of her sanity.
Tommy Lee Jones, who co-scripted the film, doesn't spare the audience the horrors and hardness people faced on the frontier. We get a very real (and often disturbing) sense of the prevalence of infant mortality and disease and how the grueling efforts to make a life as a farmer could take a punishing toll on one's sanity.

After Mary finds a carriage to transport the women, she happens upon a man named George Briggs (Tommy Lee Jones) who sits on a horse with a noose around his neck. We saw him earlier occupying the farm of Bob Giffen, who he claims abandoned the place to travel east to find a wife. The other farmers drive George from the property and execute their own brand of frontier justice by leaving him to hang. Mary frees him and after hearing George's story, offers him a job accompanying her on her trip. George refuses then accepts after Mary promises him $300. George is a ragged-looking drifter who has seen his share of death and brutality. His love for whiskey doesn't endear him to Mary nor does his rough-hewn manner.

George is forced to hide inside the carriage when he explains to Mary that some of the husbands of the women they are to transport are the same men who left him to hang. Gro's husband recognizes George and when he accosts him, he is given a violent rap on the nose while Mary levels her rifle at him as they pull away.

It seems there has been a movement in cinema the last twenty years or so to make dialogue in westerns and in frontier period pieces sound more authentic. Films like Unforgiven, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and the Cohen brother's True Grit all feature a blend of literate and colloquial speech that seems to be true to the period. The verbal exchanges between George and Mary reflect this nicely as her eloquence plays against his profanity-laced comments.

As Mary and George set out, with the women inside the carriage, he draws from his rough and tumble experiences to guide their course. Mary's suggestion on where to cross a river is met by George's ominous warning about who they might encounter if they follow her lead. George tells Mary that anyone they meet might want to rape the women and any Indians they may run into will most certainly rape the women before killing them.

George is soon proven correct. When George and Mary wake one morning to find Arabella has wandered off, he finds her seated behind a dirty, ragged man (a scary Tim Blake Nelson) on a horse who has no intention of returning her. He is also quite frank about what he intends to do with her. After George's friendly negotiations lead nowhere, the two men engage in a knife fight that ends badly for the abductor when Arabella shoots him.

En route to their destination, Mary learns George is a deserter from an army unit who visited its own kind of brutality on the enemy during the Civil War. Though George's interest in Mary's mission is strictly mercenary, he carries a kind of subtle decency and sense of duty that belies his behavior.

Not long after, another harrowing experience greets George and Mary when a group of Shawnee Indians silently shadow the carriage. Before George sets out to offer the menacing natives one of Mary's prized horses, he offers her some grim advice about what to do in the event he's killed.

Jones long shots of the seemingly endless, desolate, flat, barren prairie, with its bitterly cold winds, adds visual emphasis to the lawlessness of the plains and the unforgiving loneliness that envelops all who partake of its empty vastness.

More grisly and violent episodes accompany the group en route to their Iowan destination. One particularly shocking development occurs after a night where Mary proposes marriage to George and even goes as far as forcing her naked body upon him while the three women watch bewilderingly. What happened the morning after, I didn't expect, which is a testament to the story's wrenching, anything-can-happen unpredictability.

What happens after is no less bleak. Jones's story is never sentimental nor does it attempt to spin its history for the audience's peace-of-mind. The ending is a victory and a defeat. George finds his monetary reward has been rendered worthless currency by the failure of the bank it represents which also means a bad end for the people Mary and George left behind in the small, farming community. And to exacerbate his situation, he realizes his time as a drifter may not be at an end, for he finds himself unwelcome everywhere, which gives the title its ironic twist.

Hilary Swank and Tommy Lee Jones are exceptional. Jones also coaxes some fine performances from the supporting cast, including James Spader and John Lithgow, as well as Gummer, Otto and Richter, who have little dialogue yet convey sorrow, hurt and mental anguish with their eyes and disheveled appearances.

So many memorable scenes in a film add up to a solid, honest and moving experience. While watching Jones' film, I couldn't help but think about author Karen Russell's brilliant story Proving Up (formerly titled The Hox River Window), which tells a horrifying tale of sod-busters (as plains farmers were called then) trying to legitimize their land-claims only to encounter death and despair.

I found The Homesman to be quite absorbing. Jones' attention to detail, his honest depiction of the plight of women on the plains and the insanity that lay in wait for them made for something alive and dark and gritty as all hell. It could be called revisionist but it doesn't need an academic designation; it's too visceral and earthy for that.

I hope it finds life on DVD or streaming; the film is too engaging to miss--or dismiss.

Interstellar

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Christopher Nolan/Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Casey Affleck, Mackenzie Foy, Ellen Burstyn, John Lithgow, Wes Bentley, Michael Caine, Matt Damon, Topher Grace, David Gyasi and William Devane

I've wondered for some time if Christopher Nolan might someday join the ranks of cinema's directorial best. I've always thought he was ferociously talented and his style distinctive and singular. After seeing his new film Interstellar, which he penned with his brother Jonathan, I can finally say, with forceful emphasis--yes; he is on his way to entering the Pantheon. I found his new film to be monumental, highly intelligent, moving, visionary and riveting.

When one considers the film in retrospect, it seems incredible that a movie that begins on a country farm surrounded by cornfields could carry us to another galaxy, through a black hole and conclude in a space station in orbit around Saturn. But as the staggering stretches of time and space leave us breathless and our minds expanded, it's the mysteries of humanity that ultimately make Nolan's film an emotionally-rich experience.

The film's pervasive, melancholy tone begins in the opening scenes, where we see a less-habitable Earth of the near future. Though what specifically ails the planet is never overtly stated, we can see from the dust storms that smother and lash a small farming community that things aren't good. We learn that most crops have suffered some sort of mysterious blight, while only corn withstands the blankets of dust that besiege the small town residents.

In this community lives Cooper (Matthew McConaughey), his daughter Murphy (Mackenzie Foy), his son Tom (Timothee Chalamet) and his father-in-law Donald (John Lithgow). Cooper, a former pilot and engineer who now farms to survive, never had the opportunity to parlay his piloting skills into a space mission.

As he and his family endure the ominous environmental plagues, Cooper must also contend with his kid's school teachers, who believe Tom will never be qualified to be anything but a farmer, and look askance at Murph's fascination with NASA's Apollo programs. Her teacher bears a bewildering skepticism and contempt for space travel; going so far as to call the moon landing a fraud perpetrated by the U.S. government.

Strange, ghost-like occurrences begin to take place in Murph's bedroom; phenomena she attributes to the supernatural, which Cooper's rational mind interprets scientifically. Because Murph shares her father's analytical prowess, she believes the manifestation is a coded message in Morse, which offer longitude and latitudinal coordinates to a place not far from their home. When Cooper and his daughter investigate the location, they find a secret government NORAD site and when shown inside, they discover the place is actually a NASA base where a secret project involving space travel is being undertaken.

Leading this project is a brilliant scientist named Professor Brand (Michael Caine), who learns Cooper's piloting skills would be ideal for the mission he is overseeing. The professor explains to Cooper that the Earth's atmosphere is changing molecularly; becoming more nitrogen rich, which will soon make it difficult for humans to breathe and survive. The professor's project, already in advanced stages, involves finding planets suitable for human colonization. When Cooper mentions, quite reasonably, that the planets in our solar system can't support life, the doctor tells him of a worm-hole discovered near Saturn; one most likely placed by an alien race that anticipated mankind's need to abandon the Earth. The worm-hole allows travelers passage between our galaxy and another and on the other side are several planets which are candidates for colonization. These planets happen to be circling a massive black hole--at a safe distance--called Gargantua. It is also explained that several scientists have already traveled to said planets and are exploring them, though their fates remain unknown. Professor Brand offers Cooper the opportunity to travel to the planets, via the worm hole, to follow-up on the erstwhile expedition's progress.

Though eager to pilot a spaceship and satisfy his hunger to travel in space, the trip leaves Murph afraid and angry; knowing she may never see her father again. And when Cooper comes to say goodbye to his daughter, she refuses to see him. While she bars the door, books fall from her bookshelf, further confirming the existence of some sort of poltergeist, though what it actually is becomes clear later in the film.

As the mission to Saturn begins, Cooper is joined by Professor Brand's daughter Brand (Anne Hathaway), Doyle (Wes Bentley), and Romilly (David Gyasi). After their ship breaks Earth's gravitational pull, the crew enters cryogenic freeze for the long voyage. On awakening near Saturn, the crew prepares to enter the worm-hole and when they successfully navigate their way through, they find the black hole and the planets the professor described.

The shot of the Earth from space and the rings of Saturn are lovely and breathtaking. It is particularly humbling to see a massive spaceship reduced to the size of a penny next to Saturn's massive majesty. It is also fascinating that the worm-hole is presented more as a sphere rather than the traditional hole-like, sci-fi conceptions we're accustomed to seeing. Hovering like a ticking clock over these wondrous visuals is the mission's pressing objectives and the imperiled human race back on Earth. Nolan keeps the scientific intricacies of space travel and Einsteinian time-dilation reasonably accessible without drowning the audience in technical jargon.

As Cooper, Brand and the crew visit the prospective planets, they encounter some surprises, some life-threatening setbacks and one of time-dilation's mind-boggling peculiarities (time-dilation dictates that time will slow significantly for those who travel at or near the speed of light while it proceeds normally for observers. If one were to visit a distant star at light speed and return to Earth, the traveler will have hardly aged at all while hundreds or thousands of years may have passed for those on Earth). Because the planets circle a black hole, the more bizarre effects of time-dilation wreak havoc with the crew.

And because of time-dilation, Murph has aged into normally into adulthood (now represented by Jessica Chastain) while her father has more or less remained the age he was when he left Earth. Her transmissions to the Cooper's ship leave him floored when he sees the sobering sight of his aged daughter; who, in relativistic terms, is hardly younger than he.

Back on Earth, Murph has matured into an accomplished scientist who has joined Professor Brand's project and in doing so, she learns (as Cooper and crew discover separately) the mission through the wormhole was a one-way trip, which dashes her hope of ever seeing her father again. The realization has a devastating impact on her and on Cooper alike.

A tragic turn of events on one of the planets threatens the mission, which leads to some life-altering decisions for Cooper and Brand, one of which forces him into the black hole; a phenomenal sequence where travel inside a black hole is beautifully imagined; a trip that ends where one might least expect.

A film like Nolan's only works if the sterile, coldness of space can be countered by a powerful human drama, and it is. The relationship between Cooper and Murph is the dynamic that really drives the film. The desire to see Cooper keep his promise to return to his daughter is powerful, though the unimaginable distance and time between them makes that prospect seem unlikely.

Matthew McConaughey may have given the performance of his career in Interstellar. It's hard to imagine how improbable this role seems when just a decade ago his career was mired in witless, romantic comedies with Kate Hudson. That phase in his career seems as far removed from the present as the black hole is from Earth.

Hoyte Van Hoytema, the cinematographer behind Her and Let the Right One In, has a rich palette from which to work as he captures the dusty brown of a farming town, the cold grays of a icy planet and the lovely, ringed face of Saturn; real and imagined environments he records with an artist's eye.

If the film has a flaw, it might be the later scenes on Earth, which seem to pull us reluctantly away from the unbelievable drama taking place a galaxy away. The scenes of an adult Murph combating her brother to make contact with her father is necessary to the story but it can't match the scenes in space for power or wonder. And of course one could be nit-picky about the science in the film. I doubt anyone in a spacesuit would survive entry into a black hole but why should we be forced to think literally to appreciate the Nolan's imaginative story?

I think Interstellar is a masterpiece; a term I very rarely apply to any film, even great ones. It challenges our intellect and our conceptions of reality while showing us how precious a sight a human face might be when it lies beyond interstellar and intergalactic reaches, and what happens when time dilation allows a young father to visit his elderly daughter on her deathbed. And it asks us to consider the notion that our species may not me meant to occupy this celestial ball forever. Nolan asks us to consider a lot, which is what makes his film a stunning achievement.

Love is Strange

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Ira Sachs/Starring: John Lithgow, Alfred Molina and Marisa Tomei

Love is Strange isn't a love story as Hollywood narrowly defines the genre but it is a love story nevertheless.

From an original script by director Ira Sachs and screenwriter Mauricio Zacharias, Love is Strange tells the story of Ben (John Lithgow) and George (Alfred Molina), a couple of 39 years who decide the time has come to tie the knot. Following their nuptials, the couple find themselves in financial, occupational, and residential binds when Ben loses his music teaching job at a Catholic School. The two also find they have to vacate their apartment, which necessitates being separately re-located while they work out job and housing problems.

While George takes up lodging with his gay neighbors, Ben is forced to live with his nephew in an apartment with minimal spare space.

One might think of George's living situation with gay neighbors as an ideal, short-term arrangement but he soon finds the couple's mania for entertaining irksome, particularly when he arrives home in the evenings weary and in need of quiet.

Ben's situation presents a greater difficulty, for the retired artist finds himself sharing his nephew's teenage son's room, which leads to inevitable conflict. It also doesn't help that his nephew's wife Kate (Marisa Tomei), is a moderately successful writer who is home during the day and whose forbearance is worn thin by Ben's need for conversation. Ben is also a little clueless about how his chatter intrudes upon Kate's need for meditative, writerly silence. But he also finds his presence presents another kind of inconvenience, for he becomes both an active and passive participant in Kate and her husband's troubles with their teenage son Joey (Charlie Tahan). As Joey's behavior becomes increasingly rebellious and hostile, his parents are at a loss to fashion a solution. Ben becomes the target of more than one of Joey's venomous verbal attacks but he is perceptive enough to recognize the problem and the solution, while Kate and her husband remain baffled.

And while the two men suffer the inconveniences of being interlopers, their problems are compounded by the difficulties of finding a new home, which proves exceedingly difficult. With only Ben's social security as income, they find the search for low-rent apartments a protracted battle against the red-tape of city government. Another issue is the discrimination George faces after being fired from the Catholic school, which betrays the church's intolerant attitude toward gays.

The film's mode of propulsion lay in the performances. Filmed mostly in snug interiors that incarcerate the characters; it's the acting that rivets our attention. Crack actors like Lithgow and Molina make us believe they are a couple who have shared a life of nearly 40 years. A terrific scene where George instructs a young student on the finer points of playing Chopin, shows him distracted and pensive as he considers his and Ben's situation, which is more than just finances and itinerancy. As the little girl plays for George, we can almost hear him contemplating his and Ben's mortality and the imminent parting both must face.

Marisa Tomei is quite good as the put-upon wife, mother and relative whose patience begins to fray everyday Ben inhabits her sanctum, while young Charlie Tahan is affective as a troubled teen who eventually recognizes Ben's small but powerful impact on his life.

I imagine the budget was miniscule but what did the actors need but a few locations and a few interiors to give us something to hold our attention?

It goes without saying that Love is Strange won't enjoy a wide release, which is too bad. But given its limited release and its probable low-life expectancy in theaters, most viewers will have to enjoy it on DVD--hardly consolation but better than oblivion.