Plenty of good acting

Rating: Null/10 (7 December 2003)

Warning  Plenty of Spoilers (but not revealing the ending)
Interestingly, all of the three lead actors in this movie portray a role that is the opposite to a previous role for which they are well know. Tim Robbins, the coolest of the cool in Shawshank redemption, plays an emotionally disturbed victim of childhood molesting. Sean Penn, a retarded nice guy in I Am Sam, in now a ruthless ex-crook. Kevin Bacon, who had played quite a few villain roles, including most recently The Hollow Man, is now a model law enforcer, for a change.
Although the story does not quite have the twists and turns of Memento, it has a rather involved plot which is revealed through a gradual process. The following brief synopsis traces what happens chronologically, rather than how things are unveiled in the movie.
25 years ago, three neighbourhood kids Jimmy (Penn), Sean (Bacon) and David (Robbins) ran into a couple of child molesters. Only David, the most timid, got abducted and was held for 4 days, which changed his whole life. While continuing to grow up in the same neighbourhood, they three lost touch with one another. David, despite the terrible experience, managed to get married to a woman called Celeste and had a kid. While living a mundane, outwardly normal life, he carries the shadow deep inside him. Sean, the most normal of the three, becomes a useful asset to society: a police detective. His private life however has not gone too well as his pregnant wife broke up with him, probably escalated from a petty fight for which both stubbornly refused to admit fault. Jimmy, the most rebellious, betrayed by a crook named Harris, got two years in prison. Coming out, he killed Harris, but sent money monthly from another city to his wife, who believed that her husband had left her but was responsible enough to continue supporting the family of two sons, Brendan and younger brother Ray, a mute. When his wife died of illness, Jimmy re-married, to Celeste's sister Annabeth, who bore him two more girls, in addition to lovely Katie from his first wife.

The story evolved around the murder of Katie who, shot in her car, tried to escape into the woods, and was beaten on the head and shot again. Brendan Harris, Katie's boyfriend who is going to run away with her to Vegas, becomes the first suspect, particularly after the killing bullets are found to have been fired from a gun his father used years ago in a burglary. The fact that Katie's father openly hates the Harris family does not help him either. However, David soon becomes a prime suspect. On the murder night, he actually saw Katie at a bar, and came home later covered in blood, with his hand slashed. Celeste does not find her husband's story about a mugger convincing and the couple falls under the shadow of mistrust and hidden tension. While I'm not going to reveal the crucial ending here, I would say that it's unsatisfactory. Most unconvincing is that Sean, a model law enforcing officer, will back off from pursuing a crime which he knows has taken place, and this is not even a case of dubiously justifiable vigilante-type revenge.
Eastwood's direction offers lucid use of the movie camera, in a good variety of shots, particularly during the early part of the movie. I particularly like the scene with Robbins and Penn sitting in the back porch, when the subdued intensity of their dialogue is captured by a succession of alternating, approaching close ups. The power of this series of static shots cannot be matched by even the most violent of physical movements. Overall, Eastwood has stayed clear of the sensational thriller, or the Hitchcock look-alike suspense approaches. The exceptionally plain story telling is very effective with this movie, leaving the audience to focus on enjoying the acting.
As my summary line suggests, there is plenty of good acting, and this is not just the three key roles, but all around. Penn has the most explosive role, which he handles well. But somehow, there is a feeling that he is trying maybe just a touch too hard, with at the back of his mind that Oscar that I Am Sam didn't fetch him. Robbins on the other hand has just the right touch, subtle where he should be and explicit where he needs to be. Bacon's role is more standard, in which it's easy to do a respectable job but hard to shine. The interesting little interlude of the silent phone call from his estranged wife does help to brighten things up. He is also helped by interaction with dependable Laurence Fishburne, once charismatic and explosive Morpheus in Matrix, now all rational and restrained. Not to be outshone are the two women, sisters in the movie, married to David and Jimmy. Oscar holder Marcia Gay Harden plays near neurotic Celeste so well that the audience is torn between pitying her and despising her. Laura Linney, with a fraction of the screen time allotted to Harden, delivered top-notch performance in a scene where Annabeth, after the rather traumatic climax experienced by husband Jimmy, reassures him that he is always king in a family that will forever be strong. The younger members of the cast Tom Guiry (Brendan), Emmy Rossum (Katie) and Spencer Treat Clark (Ray) all put in good performances that complement those of the veterans. All told, the two-and-a-quarter hour movie is a very enjoyable cinematic experiences mainly because of well-balanced, all round good acting.