Four stars. Rating: R, for profanity and vulgarity
By Derrick Bang
I’ve been waiting 40 years for
Bruce Dern to snag this sort of role.
And so, I would imagine, has he.
 |
| When David (Will Forte, left) insists on seeing the house where his father Woody (Bruce Dern, center left) grew up, the building's sad, dilapidated and abandoned state aptly mirrors Woody's dismay over the lifetime of disappointment that haunts him. Woody's wife Kate (June Squibb) takes advantage of this excuse to dredge up unpleasant memories, while David's brother Ross (Bob Odenkirk) warily watches his combative parents, wondering if they'll flare into another squabble. |
The American film industry has no
shortage of unsung and underappreciated actors, male and female. Some carve out
respectable careers as supporting players: familiar faces who, with their mere
presence, immediately raise the quality of a given movie. Jack Warden, George
Sanders, Joan Cusack, Shelley Winters and George Kennedy come to mind.
Others work just as hard but never
quite achieve name-brand recognition: forever hoping for that one golden shot
that’ll make all the difference, usually retiring into obscurity without having
had that chance.
Thanks to Nebraska, Dern is one of the lucky ones.
Until now, he has been the
stalwart second banana in projects as varied as Smile, The Great Gatsby, All the Pretty Horses and Coming Home, the latter earning him a
well-deserved Academy Award nomination. Leading roles have been few, but I’ve
never forgotten the intensity of his essentially solo turn in 1972’s Silent Running (a sci-fi entry dismissed
as preposterous at the time, which has become more uncomfortably prophetic with
every passing year).
Dern brought life not only to his
own role in that cautionary tale, but also to the three boxy, robotic “drones”
that — thanks to his persuasive performance — developed their own individual
personalities. No small feat, decades before CGI magic was even a gleam in
anybody’s eye.
Even then, Dern was a master of
earnest, heartbreaking passion, imbuing his sad-sack characters with the
forever chagrined intensity of the eternally downtrodden and disenfranchised.
Men who nonetheless cling to even the faintest hope, no matter how
preposterous.
A great work of art doesn’t
emerge from an empty canvas, of course; Nebraska
also owes its deliciously biting charm to its rich script from newcomer Bob
Nelson — a remarkable big-screen debut — and the sensitive, perfectly modulated
direction of Alexander Payne, who has delighted us with misfit sagas such as Sideways, Election and The Descendants.
Payne usually writes or
collaborates on the scripts for his film; Nebraska
marks the first time he has fully surrendered the screenplay chores. But it’s
easy to see why; Nelson’s droll premise and mordant execution display the same
slow-burn humor and slightly left-of-center sensibilities, while granting us a
central character every bit as stubborn, irascible and resolutely unlovable as
Jack Nicholson’s title character in Payne’s About
Schmidt.
Tone is everything in Payne’s
films, and Nebraska could be
considered Fargo on downers: somewhat
quieter and slower, but every bit as rich with Midwestern quirks and
slow-drawlin’ ambiance.
