Movie Review: First Cow

First Cow **** ½ / *****

Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.

Written by: Jonathan Raymond and Kelly Reichardt based on the novel by Jonathan Raymond.

Starring: John Magaro (Cookie Figowitz), Orion Lee (King Lu), Toby Jones (Chief Factor), Ewen Bremner (Lloyd), Scott Shepherd (Captain), Gary Farmer (Totillicum), Lily Gladstone (Chief Factor's Wife), Rene Auberjonois (Man with Raven), Alia Shawkat (Young Woman).

 

Note: I, rather foolishly I will admit, saw First Cow in theaters last Friday (the 13th)– it was the first show of the day, and I sat nowhere near anyone – but given the current situation, I still shouldn’t have done it. But I did. It is great – and you should see it. A24 has announced they will relaunch the film at some point when all this over – yet another, albeit smaller, reason to look forward to this ending.

 

The films of Kelly Reichardt are quiet – attuned to small details and moments, that slowly, subtly build. They are the types of films that some people will love, and others will complain that “nothing happened” as they watch them. But in all of her films – including her latest, First Cow, a lot is happening – but it is happening quietly. First Cow is, like her breakthrough Old Joy, a tale of male friendship. But it’s also more than that. It is a Western, of a sort, and will undeniably remind viewers of Robert Altman’s masterpiece McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971). Like that film, this one is also very concerned with capitalism and the effect it has on people – who push themselves too far, to try and get a little bit a head, even if it endangers them now. It is a film of subtle power – the exact type of film you expect from Reichardt at this point in her career.

 

The main action centers on Cookie Figowitz (John Magaro) – the cook from a group of trappers in Oregon, in the 1820s. They aren’t the biggest of outfits – and the long weeks and months in the wilderness has made tensions rise, tempers to grow short – and Cookie ends up on the receiving end of the abuse. He first meets King Lu (Orion Lee) – when he comes across him late one night, where King is completely naked. He tells his story – strange as it is – and Cookie protects him. Later, they will meet again in “town” – where the two will become a more permanent pair, without ever quite laying out the terms of their agreement. It is easier for them to survive if they work together.

 

The title of the movie refers the area’s first cow – shipped in by the Chief Factor (Toby Jones) – an Englishman, who wanted some milk for his tea. The female cow survives the long journey – her mate, and offspring don’t. Cookie observes, innocently enough, that he is tired of the bread they are forced to eat – made of flour and water – he sure could use some milk. And so, First Cow, becomes a quiet, strange heist film in its way – every night, the pair sneak out and milk the cow, and make biscuits that they sell in town for big money. No one can figure out how they do it. They make money – a lot for that area – but instead of getting out while the getting is good, they just keep pushing things further and further – desperate to get enough to set them up in a dream scenario that at some level, they both know will never happen – but they cannot give up on anyway.

 

The way Reichardt slowly, subtly layers in everything she is doing here is terrific. It’s a film that builds everything piece by piece, but never spells everything out for you either. You have to do some of that building yourself. She has always had a way with casting – finding the right faces for her films, and the same is true here.  Magaro is perfectly cast as the quiet Cookie, someone who tries to keep a low profile, keep his head down, and just get through it. He is matched by Lee as the more entrepreneurial King Lu – pushing everything further and further. They are outsiders – as are many in this film – King Lu is from China, when we meet him, he is running away from Russians – the Chief Factor is British, even Cookie, with that last name, may well be Jewish – even if it’s never quite breached. Reichardt fills the film with interesting faces and actors – some of them just for a scene or two, like the Lily Gladstone (so great in Reichardt’s Certain Women) – who plays the Chief Factor’s Wife (there must be a story there – one that, sadly, we don’t hear).

 

It all leads, as I suppose it must, to tragedy – but the power of the movie is how it moves there slowly, surely subtly. This is one of Reichardt’s best films – but then again, they all kind of are. She doesn’t make bad films, just assured ones like this.

The Films of Kelly Reichardt Certain Women (2016)

Certain Women (2016) 

Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.

Written by: Kelly Reichardt based on the stories by Maile Meloy.

Starring: Laura Dern (Laura), James Le Gros (Ryan), Jared Harris (Fuller), Ashlie Atkinson (Secretary), Guy Boyd (Personal Injury Lawyer), Edelen McWilliams (Fuller's Wife), John Getz (Sheriff Rowles), James Jordan (Hostage Specialist), Matt McTighe (Officer Tommy Carroll), Joshua T. Fonokalafi (Amituana), Michelle Williams (Gina), Sara Rodier (Guthrie), Rene Auberjonois (Albert), Lily Gladstone (The Rancher), Kristen Stewart (Elizabeth Travis).

 

The third story of Kelly Reichardt’s Certain Women tells is perhaps the best thing she has ever directed – and brings out the absolute best in her as a filmmaker. It is subtle, and heartbreaking, and ends on an absolute perfect note and is brought to life by two great performances – one by Kristen Stewart, and the other by Lily Gladstone, in what is really one of the decades finest turns. The other two stories in Certain Women work as well – and Reichardt was smart enough to know which story to end on – but they just aren’t quite as perfect as that final one.

 

The first story stars Laura Dern as a lawyer, who is having an affair with Ryan (James LeGros) and is getting fed up with her most annoying client – Fuller (Jared Harris). Fuller was injured on the job, clearly because of his company’s negligence, but he already settled with them, for next to nothing – so as she has explained to him for six months, he cannot sue them. She finally relents, and takes to another lawyer – a man – who tells him the same thing, and he finally listens. What follows is a lowkey hostage situation.

 

The second story is about Gina (Michelle Williams), who wants to get a lot of old sandstone from an old local man, Albert (Rene Auberjonois) – who has been holding onto those stones for decades, always planning to do something, and never getting around to it. She is building a new house with her husband – Ryan, the man having the affair with Laura Dern, which never comes up in this segment, but our knowledge of it casts a shadow over this segment – this marriage is not solid right now. The heart of this segment is a long conversation the three of them have – one where Gina does all the talking to the couple, but Albert directs every reply to Ryan.

 

Then comes the third, perfect segment. Lily Gladstone plays a rancher, who drifts into town one evening and ends up in a classroom, where Elizabeth (Kristen Stewart) is teaching a class on school law to a bunch of teachers who clearly want more specifics on how they can get more money, or better parking, than what Elizabeth has to teach. Elizabeth has a long drive – four hours each way - that she to take the two nights a week she teaches the class. She and Gladstone start heading to the local diner after each class – where Elizabeth talks about her life, and Gladstone gladly listens. There may be romantic interest there – on Gladstone’s part – but she’s too shy to say anything, although a romantic horse ride one day is a high point. And then, one day, Elizabeth is not there in class – she has been replaced.

 

The first two segments in the film are clearly about lowkey, understated sexism, and how the women in it just have to deal with it and move on. This is Wyoming after all and complaining isn’t going to get anything done. Dern is excellent in her role – an overworked woman who doesn’t see, or doesn’t care, how desperate Fuller is. Harris is also excellent in his role – he’s the typical “nice guy” with seething resentment underneath. The second segment is probably the weakest – Williams is typically excellent, but this segment is more about the regret of Albert than anything else – and more than anything, just kind of stops, rather than ends.

 

But that third segment is a doozy. It is Reichardt at her very best. A short story where nothing is said aloud, outright – and yet everything is crystal clear. The last scene between Stewart and Gladstone is heartbreaking in its awkwardness – and then comes the best scene Reichardt has ever directed – the long scene of Gladstone in her truck, all by herself. It’s masterful

 

And to be honest, the movie probably should have ended there. The film flashes back and shows us a coda for all three segments after that scene – codas that in regards to the first two should have just been included in the stories in the first place, and for the third isn’t necessary at all. They’re good scenes – but had you left the theater right after Gladstone the ending would hit harder.

 

In all though, Certain Women is another subtle triumph for Reichardt. It shows her at her very best in that third segment – and near her best with the other two. It’s a film that doesn’t explain, doesn’t underline – just subtly shows you just what these women are going through. More often than not, these kind of movies, a series of shorts, don’t work this well – and even if one of the stories is clearly the best, all three still work.

The Films of Kelly Reichardt: Night Moves (2013)

Night Moves (2013) 

Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.

Written by: Jonathan Raymond & Kelly Reichardt.

Starring: Jesse Eisenberg (Josh), Dakota Fanning (Dena), Peter Sarsgaard (Harmon), Alia Shawkat (Surprise), Logan Miller (Dylan), Kai Lennox (Sean), Katherine Waterston (Anne), James Le Gros (Feed Factory Clerk), Traber Charles Burns (Felix), Autumn Nidalmia (Mable), Barry Del Sherman (Corser), Joel Polinsky (Goose).

 

I remember watching Night Movies at TIFF in 2013, and thinking that it was a surprisingly conventional thriller for a director like Kelly Reichardt – whose previous film, Meek’s Cutoff, was anything but a conventional Western. It was a little slower than most thrillers – but the basically structure and payoff, where very classically thriller. Watching it again for the first time since then, what struck me about Night Moves is that even if the plot is classic thriller, that Reichardt takes her time in slowly building everything, in slowly establishing everything. The film is basically cut in half by an act of violence in the middle – and the first half is better than the second – but even if the characters in the film are basically pawns to the narrative, the film never feels like that.

 

The first strange decision by Reichardt is casting Jesse Eisenberg in the lead role of Josh. Josh is not a typically Eisenberg character – he doesn’t talk a mile a minute – often, he barely talks at all. He works on an organic farm in the Pacific Northwest, and believes that people need a wake-up call. Even before the film begins (continuing a Reichardt tradition of sorts, of starting movies after their plot has already begun) – he has started planning a bombing of a damn – alongside his friend Harmon (Peter Sarsgaard, who was once a Marine) and another friend from the farm – Dena (Dakota Fanning) – perhaps a rich girl slumming it for a while, but certainly committed. The explosion will be more symbolic than anything – but for them, it will serve as a wakeup call – and a call to arms. Enough with making documentaries about the problem of Climate Change. You have to do something.

 

The first half of the movie is everything leading up to that explosion. It is a slow motion procedural of everything the trio does to prepare – buying a boat, in cash, while Josh and Dena act as a couple. Sending Dena into the farm supply store to try and buy a lot of fertilizer – the change that you can make into explosives – and getting a lot of lowkey tension in the suspicions of the manager (a wonderful James Le Gros – who come to think of it, is always wonderful in these roles). And then, the setting of the explosion itself – and the getaway. The film builds an unreal amount of tension, considering that it doesn’t have anything resembling shootouts or car chases, etc. It just slowly, and methodically, builds that tension.

 

The second half of the film is the fallout of the explosion. It both goes according to plan, and has some unintended consequences that they all have to live with. Harmon can do so without much effort – Josh has some interior struggle, but certainly doesn’t want to get caught. Dena though – perhaps realizing she isn’t really cut out for this, and maybe becomes a loose cannon.

 

Again, the tension in the second half is built slowly – through conversations, in which people subtly intuit what has happened, but don’t really want to get involved. It leads to where it must. While it is true that more than any of Reichardt’s other film, Night Moves is a more traditional, narrative driven film – with characters at the service of the plot more than being the central driving force of the film, the film also never loses focus on them. It requires the performances – particularly that of Eisenberg – to do a lot of heavy lifting, with not a lot of dialogue to explain everything. While I won’t say it’s the best performance Eisenberg has ever given – I do think it’s second to his brilliant performance in The Social Network, and the exact opposite of that performance in many ways.

 

I do prefer Reichardt when she basically jettisons narrative. I don’t think Night Moves is quite the film that Old Joy, Wendy & Lucy or Meek’s Cutoff were – I also think I underrated Night Moves when it came out as well. It is in many ways a traditional thriller – but it’s one that has been slowed down to Reichardt speed, and somehow, that makes it even more intense.  

The Films of Kelly Reichardt: Meek's Cutoff (2010)

Meek's Cutoff (2010) 

Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.

Written by: Jonathan Raymond.

Starring: Michelle Williams (Emily Tetherow), Bruce Greenwood (Stephen Meek), Will Patton (Soloman Tetherow), Zoe Kazan (Millie Gately), Paul Dano (Thomas Gately), Shirley Henderson (Glory White), Neal Huff (William White), Tommy Nelson (Jimmy White), Rod Rondeaux (The Indian).

 

Even if you’re like me – and seen a lot of Westerns – you haven’t seen one quite like Meek’s Cutoff before. This a Wagon Train movie – about three families making their way across the vast Western landscape of America, in search of a better life in a new location, led by a man named Meek, who assures them that they are taking a shortcut. Even before the movie opens though, it’s clear that they are lost, and that Meek has no idea where he’s going. They are simply wandering around this vast empty space, not sure where they are going, or if they will ever get there. There is no romanticization of the Old West in Meek’s Cutoff, and none of the violence we are used to seeing. There isn’t much a plot either. What it evokes, more than anything, is what it must have been like travelling through this emptiness, not knowing where you’ll end up.

 

For director Kelly Reichardt, she is interested more in the female characters, than the male ones in the film. Yet, this isn’t a revisionist history about powerful women – they are treated much like “womenfolk” in Westerns often are. The men go off and talk amongst themselves – about how they doubt that Meek (Bruce Greenwood) knows what he’s doing. Reichardt stays with the women in these scenes though – often as they strain to hear what their husbands are saying. Yet the women are the backbone of the story – and they are the backbone of the families as well. As the film moves along, and they get more hopelessly lost, it is Emily (Michelle Williams) who has the best ideas, although they are filtered to the larger group through her husband Soloman (Will Patton) – at least at first.

 

The group starts to grow worried – they are in the desert, and starvation and dehydration are real concerns. Eventually, the group with capture and Indian (Rod Rondeaux) – but it is Emily who is smart enough to know they have to use him to save themselves. He, and his people, have survived in this area for generations – surely, he can lead them to water, and perhaps out. The depiction of The Indian (never named) is another area in which Meek’s Cutoff is different than other Westerns. He isn’t a savage, but he isn’t the “noble” type either. He doesn’t befriend any of them, and remains largely silent and unreadable. He needs to survive, and so do the settlers – so a mostly silent truce between them is struck.

 

Reichardt made the odd decision to shoot the film in Academy Aspect ratio – basically almost a square (1.33: 1) – which is a format many old movies used, but few newer ones do. It’s a particularly daring choice for a movie that takes place in such wide open spaces – spaces in which you would expect to see large scale vistas that dwarf the characters. No so here – the Aspect ratio basically traps the character in the frame – in the spot they find themselves in. One vista is the same as every other – they are still tapped, still have nowhere to go.

 

The cast is uniformly excellent – even if it’s mainly Williams, making her second straight film with Reichardt – who stands out the most. Again, this is a quiet performance, like hers in Wendy & Lucy was. But it’s a forceful one when it needs to be. She doesn’t want to die out here –and does what she can to survive. Greenwood is quite good as Meek as well – a portrait of male folly. He is sure he knows where he is going, and it takes him right up until the end to finally admit he doesn’t.

 

Meek’s Cutoff is a slow movie in many ways. It doesn’t have the narrative you expect in Westerns, none of the conflicts, gunfights and blowups. It is about these people, prisoners in the vast wilderness, with no idea where to go – stuck on a shortcut to nowhere. It’s an intelligent film – and a haunting one, and like the best of Reichardt’s work, doesn’t try to wrap anything up, doesn’t try to reassure you of anything when it ends.

The Films of Kelly Reichardt: Old Joy (2006)

Old Joy (2006) 

Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.

Written by: Jonathan Raymond and Kelly Reichardt.

Starring: Daniel London (Mark), Will Oldham (Kurt), Tanya Smith (Tanya), Robin Rosenberg (Waitress), Keri Moran (Lawnmower).

 

Old Joy is one of the most quietly moving films about male friendship I have ever seen. It’s one of those films that will leave many complaining that nothing happens, but if you’re paying attention, a lot happens – everything really. It centers on a weekend camping trip taken by two old friends, who have drifted apart for reasons never explained, but easily to intuit – and how they come back together, if only briefly.

 

Mark (Daniel London) is married with a kid on the way, and a job and while he seems quietly content, he doesn’t hesitate when his old friend Kurt (Will Oldham) gets back in touch, and suggests a weekend camping trip in the nearby mountains – and a visit to a hot spring there. Kurt is the opposite of Mark – still drifting in his life, with no real direction – he talks of plans, but you doubt he’ll ever follow through on any of them, and spends much of his time still getting stoned. Mark has moved on from whatever high school, or college, friendship they had – but Kurt is still holding on. You get the sense that Kurt wants to reconnect, because Mark is far from the only friend Kurt has been disconnected to over the years – whereas for Mark, the weekend is an excuse to get out of his impending fatherhood for a couple of days.

 

The film is quiet and subtle – and only 76 minutes long. A lot of time is spent with the pair of them in the car – listening to talk radio lamenting the ineffective Democrats for not doing more to stand up to Bush (oh, what innocent times 2006 seem today). Kurt says he knows where they’re going – but of course, he doesn’t. Because Kurt is played by Will Oldham, he talks – a lot – about his plans, about his thoughts and opinions about the universe (including lamenting the fact that when he took a course of physics, he knew more than those teaching it – although he doesn’t have “the math” to back up what he’s saying. Mark is quieter – more in his own head than connecting with Kurt.

 

The film never spells anything out for the audience – it doesn’t need to. We recognize immediately why these two used to be friends, and why they aren’t so much anymore. Words aren’t needed for that – it’s all there in the interactions between these two men, and the great performances by London and Oldham. Whatever connection hey had is broken, but you can see its remnants there, and how both make concessions for the other one – not calling them out on things that if they were closer, they may well have. It leads up to that scene at the hot springs, where perhaps, for a moment, that connection is restored.

 

This is the film where you really do start to see what would become director Kelly Reichardt’s signature style coming through. She has an unflashy, unhurried style. She sits back and observes, and lets the characters interactions tell us everything, without explicitly telling us anything. You have to intuit a lot in her movies, because she doesn’t spell it out.

 

Old Joy is a subtly powerful film, and its powerful precisely because it doesn’t try to be. It gets us inside this strained friendship for a little while, and tells us everything we need to know about it – and the characters themselves. By the end, you get the feeling that they may never see each other – that some gaps are too much to overcome – unless you’re at the hot springs.

The Films of Kelly Reichardt: River of Grass (1994)

River of Grass (1994) 

Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.

Written by:  Kelly Reichardt and Jesse Hartman.

Starring: Lisa Bowman (Cozy), Larry Fessenden (Lee Ray Harold), Dick Russell (Jimmy Ryder), Stan Kaplan (J.C.), Michael Buscemi (Doug), Lisa Robb (Young Cozy), Carol Flakes (Lee's Grandmother), Frances Reichardt (Lee's Mom), George Moore (Detective Kirby), Mannie Mack (Mr. Humphery), Monica Davidson (Mrs. Ortiz), Jerry Utter (Doug's Father - voice), Murray Von Murry (Robber), Carl Crowder (Loiterer), Matthew Sigal (Thief), Santo Fazio (Det. Ortiz), Greg Schroeder (Bobby).

 

In many ways, Kelly Reichardt’s debut film River of Grass feels like many other films from young, first time filmmakers. It tells a fairly standard story – of a couple on the run from the law, which is the type of story it feels like young filmmakers make when they don’t really know what they want to say quite yet. Reichardt certainly has her own take on the story – in terms of style, in terms of character, and even in terms of narrative – but it does feel like the film by a filmmaker still trying to figure out what they want to say. Watching it, you wouldn’t guess the career that Reichardt would go on to have – but you certainly do know that she will have a career – the talent is evident.

 

River of Grass takes place in Florida – Southern Florida, away from the tourists and beaches, and basically just a hot, sweaty, depressing wasteland. The main character is Cozy (Lisa Bowman), a young woman, already married, already with a couple of kids. She is bored in her life, and you can tell. She goes out drinking at a bar one night, and meets Lee (Larry Fessenden, playing a creep, because that’s what you hired him to play) and the pair just kind of hang out – eventually they end up by a pool, playing with a gun Lee has – a gun that accidentally goes off. Cozy believes she has accidentally killed someone – but in fact no one was harmed, something we (and Lee) find out fairly soon – but he never bothers to tell Cozy. He’s having too much fun “on the lam” as it were. They pair never do have sex – there is never any love between them at all – and they have no money to go on the run for real, so they spend their time hold up in a hotel, or driving around town looking for some money to get away.

 

There is a restless energy to River of Grass that is like nothing Reichardt has done since. The film has a drum heavy jazz score pulsating throughout much of the movie that helps keep the energy up. Reichardt also spends more time in cars than she will later – right inside with the two of them as they drive along. She also employs voice over narration supplied by Cozy – narration that feels a little like Sissy Spacek’s in Badlands, as both narrators aren’t quite accurately describing what is happening, which we in the audience can see.

 

There isn’t a lot that connects River of Grass with Reichardt’s other films – which mainly take place in the Pacific Northwest, and this is about as far away from there as you can get and still be in America. What they do share perhaps is its focus on people on the fringes of society – people running away from something, but don’t really have the money to do so. A few hundred bucks would be all these two strangers would really need to fulfill their plans – but they aren’t going to get that from anywhere. Her characters are trapped in their circumstances – with no way out.

 

The film differs in another way – and that’s the ending, which gives a more definite ending to the story that Reichardt often gives her films. It is a shocking act that ends the film, as Cozy eventually does discover that she didn’t actually blow up her life, and decides to do so anyway. It’s an ending I’m not entirely sure I buy. But it comes at the end of a movie that captures these sad lives of quiet desperation these people are living – so desperately unhappy, and trapped with no way out. Perhaps Reichardt didn’t make another film for 12 years because she needed to find her own voice, her own style – something she has brilliantly honed ever since. But her talent here is evident.

The Film of Kelly Reichardt: An Introduction

Ever since seeing Kelly Reichardt’s 2006 film Old Joy, I have been a fan of hers. Since then, she has made five other films – including the upcoming First Cow – and she has yet to make a bad film. I figured it was time to revisit her filmography – including her 1994 debut film River of Grass – which I have never seen before (I have also never seen her quasi-short, quasi-feature Ode – but that doesn’t seem to be available anywhere).

Her films are subtle and quiet – but incredibly well-observed and moving. It’s a great filmography – and I look forward to seeing them again.

Onto the initial ranking:

N/A River of Grass (1994) – I haven’t seen this one – I remember when Old Joy came out, a few people referenced her debut from a decade earlier, but not much – and I never had a chance to catch-up with it. I cannot wait to see it.

5. Night Moves (2013) – This is probably Reichardt’s most conventional film – a thriller about a group of environment activists who are planning an act of terrorism. It’s quite good – and not quite a conventional thriller – but still, I think I prefer Reichardt’s normal mode.

4. Old Joy (2006) – A very good, subtle, gentle film about two men who try and rekindle their friendship now that they are in their 30s, and have gone their separate ways in life in many ways. It’s the type of film where so many say nothing happened – but they are not paying attention.

3. Certain Women (2016) – A trio of stories about women, all of which are terrific and has an amazing cast. I do think the film gets better as it moves along – the first story stars Laura Dern as a lawyer trying to defuse to a hostage situation, the second has Michelle Williams as a woman who wants to break new ground on a home, and will not take no for an answer. The final story though – with Lily Gladstone as a young farmer, who falls in love with her teacher (Kristen Stewart) is quite simply stunning.

2. Meek’s Cutoff (2010) – Reichardt’s film about a group of settlers travelling through the Oregon desert in 1845, and take an ill-advised “short-cut” that leads to nowhere. It is a Western, but one that traps the characters in the vast open spaces, rather than seeing it as freedom. It’s about women’s place in this world – who no matter how qualified, they will never be in charge. It features another great Michelle Williams performance.

1.Wendy & Lucy (2008) – For me, Wendy & Lucy, which is a remarkably simple film, is Reichardt’s best – and one of the most emotional films I can remember seeing. The story is simple – a woman named Wendy is making her way to Alaska, and stops in a small Oregon   town, and one horrible thing after another happens to her – leaving her separated from her dog Lucy, and without a way to get out of town. It’s a simple story – but it builds to one of the most emotional moments I have ever seen in a film – one that moves me as much as the final moments between Harry & Tonto. A quiet, subtle masterpiece.

Movie Review: Certain Women

Certain Women

Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.   

Written by: Kelly Reichardt based on the stories by Maile Meloy.

Starring: Laura Dern (Laura), Michelle Williams (Gina), Kristen Stewart (Elizabeth Travis), Lily Gladstone (The Rancher), James Le Gros (Ryan), Jared Harris (Fuller), John Getz (Sheriff Rowles), Joshua T. Fonokalafi (Amituana), Sara Rodier (Guthrie), Rene Auberjonois (Albert). 

 

The films of Kelly Reichardt are at their best when seemingly nothing is actually happening. She makes the type of films that the unobservant say “nothing happens” in – and yet, if you’re paying attention, Reichardt says more with her depictions of the everyday, the mundane, than most filmmakers do with a lot more dramatics. Her most recent film before Certain Women was Night Moves – a fine film in its own right, but probably Reichardt’s weakest – in part because it is the most plot driven. This is a filmmaker at her best when telling simple stories – like the two old friends reuniting for a trip only one wants to take in Old Joy, or in its depiction of a woman too poor to take her dog with her to the next town in Wendy & Lucy. With Certain Women, Reichardt has adapted three short stories by Maile Meloy, and makes a little effort to ensure they interlock – but mainly, these are everyday stories – where it’s what is left unsaid by the characters that carries the most weight.

 

In the first story Laura Dern plays Laura – a lawyer, sleeping with a married man, Ryan (James LeGros), who arrives at work to once again be confronted (in a friendly manner), by her most annoying client – Fuller (Jared Harris). She has told him he has no case against his former employer for a workplace injury – not because they are not at fault, but because he signed away his right to soon with a too quick, too small settlement. Fuller finally accepts this – not because he believes Laura, but because she brings in a colleague – a man – who explains the same thing to Fuller. Fuller does something desperate then – and Laura is called in to talk him down. He doesn’t really think he’ll get away with it, but does it anyway.

 

We then move onto Gina (Michelle Williams), who along with her husband – Ryan, the guy sleeping with Laura – is planning on building a new house. They go to see Albert (Rene Auberjouinis), an old man, to buy a load of sandstone that has simply been sitting on his land for decades now. Albert is hesitant to make the sale – not because he’s going to use the sandstone – but because years ago, he and his now dead brother, planned to use it, and never got around to it. Like the first segment, the woman is more than competent – Gina is clearly in charge, and yet Albert only addresses Ryan when they talk, even if Gina does most of the talking the other way. She grows frustrated, but cannot show it – unless she screw up the sale.

 

The final segment is easily the best – hell, it’s one of the best things I’ve seen all year. It stars Lily Gladstone as a rancher named Jaime, who after a long day working the ranch, heads into town, and wanders into a classroom, where Elizabeth (Kristen Stewart), is teaching school law. There’s only a few other students, Jaime isn’t really registered, and Elizabeth barely knows the subject matter. Not only that, she has to drive four hours, each way, to teach the twice weekly class. The two become friends over the weeks – heading to the local diner after each class for a few minutes of conversation. Then, one evening, Elizabeth doesn’t show – but a replacement does. And Jaime goes to see her.

 

The first two stories are about casual, understated misogyny – Fuller won’s listen to Laura, but will to her male colleague – although when he knows he’s screwed, it’s her he wants to talk to (perhaps thinking – wrongly – that she’ll be more likely to help him out). In the second, Gina and Ryan are trying to build a new house, even though their own marriage has a faulty foundation (yes, the metaphor is a little strained, but it’s there). I liked the first segment more than the second – Dern and Harris are great, and even though the film’s narrative goes into some well-trod territories, it does so in a more understated way than normal, and ends with a quiet whimper. The second is the weakest of the three segments – even if Williams, a Reichardt regular, gives a typically wonderful performance. The whole segment just seems like it’s building to something that just never comes.

 

But it’s the third segment that makes Certain Women special. In it, Kirsten Stewart shows, once again, why she’s one of the best actresses around – and yet even her great work cannot compare to the work done by Lily Gladstone as Jaime. This segment gradually builds into a quiet, heartbreaking unrequited love story – one in which Jaime puts herself out there – for perhaps the first time – and then has to deal with the aftermath, all by herself, in her quiet stoic way (Reichardt simply leaves the camera on her for a long time as she drives away). It’s one of the very best moments of any film this year.

 

Reichardt is a filmmaker whose films are always interesting while they are running – and then grows in your mind the further and further away you get from them. It’s a quiet film, a subtle one – but its al the more moving because Reichardt doesn’t force it. I’m not sure it’s her best film – that would Wendy & Lucy – but it’s close. 

Movie Review: Night Moves

Night Moves
Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.   
Written by: Kelly Reichardt  & Jonathan Raymond.
Starring: Jesse Eisenberg (Josh Stamos), Dakota Fanning (Dena Brauer), Peter Sarsgaard (Harmon), Alia Shawkat (Surprise), James Le Gros (Clerk), Katherine Waterston (Anne), Clara Mamet (Jackie), Logan Miller (Dylan), Kai Lennox (Sean).

The film’s director Kelly Reichardt have made up until now are the type of slow, subtle movies that those who don’t pay attention often complain that “nothing happens” in them. Films like Old Joy, Wendy & Lucy and Meek’s Cutoff are certainly slower than most films, but so much is happening beneath their surface that the charge that nothing happens in them is absurd. No one is going to accuse Reichardt’s latest film – Night Moves – as being one of those “Nothing happens” films. The film takes the form of a thriller – and even includes one (off-screen) explosion, and murder. Yet, while the film is certainly a more mainstream effort from Reichardt, it is also undeniably one of her films – it is still about people outside mainstream society, and it still requires the audience to pay attention, because much more happens in the movie than it appears like on the surface.

The movie is centered on three eco-terrorists (or activists if you’d rather) who plot to blow up one or Oregon’s many, many dams. The exact problem they have with that particular dam is never really stated – just caustic remarks about killing the salmon so everyone can have an iPod. In fact, they never really speak about their ideology at all – there is one scene, at an underground screening of a documentary about the evils of corporation pillaging the environment, where the filmmaker says that she isn’t focused on one large thing – but rather countless small things, everyone can do to help. That’s probably about as close as you’re going to get to specific reasons in this film – the three principles are doing their “one small thing” to help.

The film opens with Josh (Jesse Eisenberg) and Dena (Dakota Fanning) at that screening, and eventually hitting the road – where they buy a used boat for cash – Dena, it seems, is one of those trust fund kids with a conscience. The exact nature of their relationship is left unstated – largely because Josh doesn’t seem to like to talk at all. They head up into the Oregon woods, where they meet up with ex-Marine Harmon (Peter Sarsgaard) and set their plan in motion. The boat with be packed with fertilizer, and when it explodes, in the middle of the night, it will destroy the dam. It’s the offseason, so no one will be around – no one will get hurt.

The movie is neatly divided into its two halves – leading up to the explosion, and its aftermath. There are several scenes where the suspense becomes almost unbearable – all the more impressive because of how Reichardt achieves this through little dialogue and without the aid of phony theatrics. A scene where Dena has to buy a lot of fertilizers for example – and has to talk the skeptical clerk (James Le Gros – a character actor who seems to specialize in these wonderful, tiny roles) into why she needs it. The scene at the dam itself, when an unexpected car stops too close for comfort as the ticking clock winds down in also expertly crafted by Reichardt. This may be her first thriller, but she has the chops to handle the genre elements amazingly well.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about the movie is just how good Eisenberg is in the lead role. We all know Eisenberg is a talented actor – but he has been typecast into movies that rely on his motor mouth skills – he is a natural for the dialogue of an Aaron Sorkin, which is why his performance in The Social Network is one of the best of the decade so far. But in Night Moves, he doesn’t speak much – and when he does, it is slower and more deliberate – he weighs the words he says, and never says more than he has to. It is altogether more impressive than that he makes Josh into a fully rounded character – and his regrets and grief that slowly take over in the second half are down with subtly as the weight of his actions slowly threatens to crush him. Fanning is also very good – in that scene in the fertilizer store in particular – but she is pretty much shunted to the background in the film’s second half. Her off screen actions drive the plot in that half, but they remain off screen until close the end. Sarsgaard is even more back grounded – showing up well into the first act, and other than an occasional voice on the phone, all but absent in the second half. The film is Eisenberg’s from start to finish – and he delivers an excellent performance.

The film itself is not quite as good as Reichardt’s previous work. I admit, I prefer the previous movies, which lacked narrative, but were more interested in human behavior. Reichardt isn’t quite as adept at handling narrative as she is her characters. Still though, Night Moves remains an uncommonly intelligent thriller – one that sticks close to its characters, and doesn’t fill the movie with phony suspense. Yes, it’s a thriller – a damn good one – but it is also a Kelly Reichardt film in all that implies.

 

Note: I saw this film at TIFF in 2013 - as far as I know, nothing has changed in the version I saw, and the one opening in limited release today.

Movie Review: Meek's Cutoff

Meek’s Cutoff ****
Directed by: Kelly Reichardt.
Written By: Jonathan Raymond.

Starring: Bruce Greenwood (Stephen Meek), Michelle Williams (Emily Tetherow), Will Patton (Soloman Tetherow), Shirley Henderson (Glory White), Neal Huff (William White), Paul Dano (Thomas Gately), Zoe Kazan (Millie Gately), Rod Rondeaux (The Cayuse).

Kelly Reichardt has quickly established herself as one of the best filmmakers of her generation. She specializes in those movies that make some in the audience complain that “nothing happened”, but that’s only because her films are so subtle, so quiet that many people miss the little things that make her films so special. It is in those quiet moments between two people in her films that everything happens – and seemingly small incidents are really the turning points of her stories.

Meek’s Cutoff is her latest film, and while it is larger in scale than her previous films, Old Joy and Wendy and Lucy, it is no less well observed. It is a film that takes place on a wagon train journey across Oregon in the 1840s, and yet it is completely devoid of the clichés that usually make up those films. The film opens with the settlers gathered around in a circle talking about whether or not they should hang their guide Meek (Bruce Greenwood), who they hired to bring them to their new home, and who ended up leading them on a shortcut to nowhere, and are now helplessly lost. Later in the film these same settlers, along with Meek this time, will gather again to discuss whether or not they should hang the Cayuse Indian they have captured, because they think that he is following them – setting them up for slaughter at the hands of his tribe some time down the line. Although she is not truly involved in these discussions – it is work for men – it really is Emily Tetherow (Michelle Williams) who holds the most sway. She is the moral center of the movie, who will argue against hanging either man, because they need them to lead them out of the desert they find themselves in. Only in a film by Reichardt would a simple act of kindness – like Emily repairing the Cayuse’s shoe – be the real turning point in the movie. “I want him to owe me something” she says at the time – and depending on how you read the ending, which is as ambigious as the infamous ending of John Sayles Limbo, it may be the smartest thing she ever does.

Meek’s Cutoff is a daring movie for several reasons. For one thing, audiences raised on Westerns have certain expectations of a wagon train movie like this (see John Ford aptly titled Wagon Master for an example), and Reichardt provides none of those things in her movie. She makes the interesting choice to shoot in 1.33:1, instead of the typical widescreen that you would normally use for a movie that provides this many opportunities for sweeping vistas shots – opportunities that Reichardt does not use. She keeps her camera squarely on the people in her film – eliminating their past and their future, concentrating solely on their present predicament, The guide is supposed to be some kind of hero, but Greenwood’s Meek is anything but. He has wild hair, a crazy beard, and strange eyes, and really he leads them all out to the middle of the desert with no exit strategy (prompting many to see the film as an allegory for the current War in Iraq, which is certainly a valid interpretation). The women are supposed to be weak and subservient, but Michelle Williams’ character is really the strongest of them all. She controls her husband (Will Patton), who controls the rest of the group – including the weak willed Thomas (Paul Dano), and the overly religious William (Neil Huff), who refuses to eat to the point of starvation.

This is a movie where the subtlest moments are the most important. To the unobservatant, it may look like “nothing happens” in Meek’s Cutoff, but that ignores the quiet moments where the entire movie dynamic changes. It takes skill in the performance to pull this off – and Michelle Williams proves once again why she is one of the best actresses of her generation, as she is able to be the moral center of the film, without upstaging the rest of them. But everyone has their moments – even the largely quiet Rod Rondeaux as the Cayuse Indian, who cannot communicate with the others on the journey, but still observes so much. The cinematography for the film is wonderful, and brings out these subtle moments, and has a wonderful dusty, dirty feel to it, that reminded me of the 1970s work on Terence Malick (even if Malick preferred widescreen). Meek’s Cutoff is a subtle film, but one that builds tremendous emotional power as it goes along. Nothing happens? Only if you’re not paying attention.