Posted 9:50 pm Friday, February 03, 2012
Clooney Gives Career-Best Performance In ‘The Descendants’
Films where a family must cope with the slow deterioration of a loved one are certainly nothing new for Hollywood, but "The Descendants" manages to find a way to separate itself in a crowded field.
What most significantly defines it is its tone. Directed by Alexander Payne and based on the novel by Kaui Hart Hemmings (trivia: one of the screenplay's co-authors, Jim Rash, plays Dean Pelton on NBC's "Community"), there is a softness, a gentleness to how the story unfolds. Most often, these films are draped with a sense of dread and a melancholy which makes them a chore to watch. The inevitability of the impending death hangs like a specter over the entire film.
And while that's true to an extent here, Payne's film is more focused on the healing process of this family, even as they struggle to define their thoughts and emotions within the ordeal. "The Descendants" contains a kind soulfulness that feels rare.
The last few months of Matt King's (George Clooney) life have been a tangle of tubes, hospital beds and general uncertainty. His wife, Elizabeth, is on life support after a boating accident left her in a coma. Their marriage was on the rocks before the accident, but now Matt wants nothing more than for his wife to recover so he can try and patch things up. His wife's condition has taken its toll on the rest of their family as well, including his daughters, the rebellious 17-year-old, Alexandra (Shailene Woodley) and 10-year-old, Scottie (Amara Miller), who copes by copying her older sister's coarse language and lashing out at her schoolmates. Matt's strife is made worse when Alex informs him that Elizabeth has been having an affair.
Piling on top of all this is an impending land sale. King and his extended family (all descendants of Hawaiian royalty) are the owners of a massive parcel of land, the last bit of pristine, unmolested land in Kaua'i. Because of legal technicalities, their trust is being dissolved soon and the family has decided to sell the land to a developer, but not without constant pressure to do otherwise from other native Hawaiians. The notions of familial legacy and responsibility are heavily at play here, both within the land side plot as well as the way Matt struggles to provide stability for his own.
What I love about "The Descendants" is the relationship between Matt and Alex. Matt knows he's been a lousy father and is desperate to try and do right by his daughters, especially now that the burden of raising them falls solely on his shoulders. He knows that anything he does may be too little too late, but he's determined none the less to try his best. And in that way his relationship with his eldest daughter becomes something interesting and special.
Even though he's constantly attempting to reassert his authority over Alex, he still looks to her for advice and insight. Alex, meanwhile, has the role of mentor and mother-figure foisted upon her, all as the two of them conspire to track down the man with whom Elizabeth was carrying on her infidelity. They are reluctant to admit as much, but Matt and Alex grow dependent on each other in ways they never expected and to watch as their relationship evolves is one of the highlights of the film.
Clooney gives the best performance of his career. Previously that is a claim which belonged to his work in "The American," and like "The American" he gives a quiet, internalized performance, although he has far more dialogue here. As a wounded, angry, confused and weary soon-to-be widower, Clooney's performance of Matt is deft combination of emotions that only rarely comes bubbling to the surface. His strife is reflected in his eyes, in his body language.
Clooney gives us Matt's soul and he does it in an expert manner. He's an actor who is often described as the heir to Cary Grant's throne. And while I've used that comparison before, I've come to find it inaccurate as Clooney is far more eager to brush the varnish from his image in a way Grant never did, to say nothing of the soul-bearing we've seen from Clooney, something you could never accuse Grant of. Grant was a movie star, Clooney has developed into an artist.
The film's true surprise, though, comes from Woodley. How the Academy managed to overlook her for her work in this film boggles the mind as she manages to not only hold her own against Clooney at the top of his game, but outshine him at various points. This is a girl who, like Hailee Steinfeld in 2010's "True Grit," gives a stunning performance of texture and depth against an already superb cast.
But it's not just those two who Payne manages to give dimension to. Alex's stoner quasi-boyfriend Sid (Nick Krause) and even, Brian (Matthew Lillard), the man Elizabeth was cheating with, and his wife, Julie (Judy Greer) are given strong moments of humanity. In the course of one scene (his only substantial one in the film, I might add) Lillard manages to make us reconsider his ability as an actor and wonder why he's mostly only been known for playing Shaggy in the live action "Scooby Doo" movies. And speaking of woefully underutilized actors, we also are privy to some wonderful moments from Robert Forster (playing Elizabeth's father), which further prove what a treasure the man is.
I placed this at No. 7 in my top 10 films of 2011, a spot that I'm still comfortable with after a second viewing. (For those wondering, I first saw the film late last year, but it has only just recently arrived in Tyler, hence my waiting until now for a full review.) This is a wonderful, honest and heartfelt film which remains a powerful testament to the importance of family.
Grade: A+
Stewart Smith is the Entertainment Editor for the Tyler Morning Telegraph. Contact him at 903-596-6301 or by e-mail at ssmith@tylerpaper.com.
