JUNEBUG (DVD)

Director: Phil Morrison (no major film work)
Starring: Amy Adams, Embeth Davidtz, Benjamin McKenzie, Alessandro Nivolla

Junebug is an excellent, if ambiguous, portrayal of family ties and conflicts. It’s a small film with a small budget, and even though it might have small goals in mind, they’re intriguingly conceived. Maybe “small” is not the right word for this story’s themes. Maybe light, or common would be a better description. The plot follows a young man in the big city as he gets married to a highbrow, hipster art dealer. Six months later they manage to find the time to introduce the girl to his southern middle class family. Comedy and confusion ensues as each character’s personal goals conflicts with all of the others. I think that the film tries not to take sides in this argument, showing the selfishness of the city folks and the lonely unhappiness of most of the country folks. There are enough characters covering a broad enough range of human emotions that everyone should find someone to connect with here.

In my opinion this ambiguity is both the film’s greatest strength and perhaps its main weakness. The movie shows flaws and triumphs in almost every character. That’s nice and allows for a broader understanding of the situations, but I think maybe that it might just be a bit of a cop out. A story that says we’re all okay and all flawed at the same time can be a nice change from the normal background voices in society screaming how they’re right and everyone else is wrong. At the same time, some people really are more right than others. Deciphering and defining those distinctions is what separates the best art, or so methinks.

So, this is a very good, very entertaining, very enlightening film. On the other hand it never really seemed to make any statements at all. That’s hard. It’s either wishy-washy, or it’s powerfully complex. I’ll place it somewhere in the middle. However, there is no doubt that it’s interesting and unique enough to receive a good grade as a film.

Standouts: Strong tone and style of story.
Blowouts: Not much to really complain about here.

Grade: A-

1/27/2006