Movie Reviews

I think I'm discovering that one of my favourite film genres is that of the "small" drama that focuses on family or individual struggles, as opposed to more "grand" films that deal with larger-scale issues. For example, some of my recent favourites include In the Bedroom, Thirteen Conversations About One Thing, You Can Count on Me, and Far From Heaven -- all of which I'd say are "small" films. Some people find these kinds of movies boring, and say that "nothing happens" in them, but I happen to feel that they're often the most sincere and real, especially when they're done well like In America.

Johnny and Sarah (Paddy Considine and Samantha Morton), and their two daughters Christy and Ariel (real-life sisters Sarah and Emma Bolger), are an Irish family who emigrate to the U.S. in search of a better life for themselves, moving into a run-down apartment in a slightly-seedy area of downtown New York. Sarah gets a low-paying job at a diner, Johnny struggles to get parts in local theatre productions, and the kids have to adapt to their new school, where everyone treats them as outsiders.

In all honesty, nothing really big or exciting happens, but it's such a wonderful film with such great performances that every tiny new challenge they face and overcome is as captivating as anything you'd see in even the biggest of epics. The relationship that develops between the family and their eccentric African artist neighbour (Djimon Hounsou) is just one example. Present beneath everything else in the film is that fact that Johnny and Sarah's firstborn child had died a year or so before they left Ireland, and it's a sadness that seems to weigh the family down very slightly throughout the movie, until the end when it's lifted -- and very powerfully, especially after learning that writer/director Jim Sheridan based much of the film on his own life experiences, including the death of his younger brother when they were both children.

Many of the more acclaimed films of 2003 seem to have been slight 'downers', so it was really nice to see a film as powerfully uplifting as In America. It's the best film of the year, in my opinion.