Reviews

The film opens with a young Stan Herd living on a farm finding ways to use his imagination creating art on the land. He uses pretty much whatever he can find. For all the joy he finds creating his art in the dirt, he finds the real place to see it is from the air. While living on a farm near Lawrence, Kansas, he has the luck to have his work photographed by a New York photographer who suggests he find a way to do a project, an earthwork, in NYC. Stan Herd has enormous gumption and heart. He makes the trip to New York and convinces Donald Trump to let him do an earthwork on land Trump plans to later develop.

All of the actors deliver performances that are in the category of what I would call sublime. There's an unusual cast of characters who arrive one by one in the New York portion of the film. Stan Herd's Kansas family is supportive, kind and caring. These are people deserving of a quiet portrayal, with real emotion that comes through without having to rise to a passion that is bombastic. They make their points softly. John Hawkes becomes a very focused Stan Herd in this film. He shows us a strong minded, talented, trusting and sweet natured man. The audience gets pulled into his world, which is actually quite beautiful and full of sunshine.

This is a film that primarily is told through Josh, the grandson in a family with a patriarch living with cancer. The matriarch has dementia. The family lives in a quaint northeastern town with beautiful houses by the ocean. Victoria Clark plays Josh's mother, a divorced woman in the famous sandwich generation, caring for her parents in their home, while being a mother still to her college aged son. Josh has two uncles, one still living in the paternal home and one who is a local politician in the town where they all live. There is tension between the brothers that adds an interesting subplot to the film. What really stands out in this film is the lovely cinematography, tight script and fabulous performances by a cast of wonderful accomplished actors. They create a family that anyone who has experience life and death with a family that has some quirky dynamics will recognize and appreciate. The real star of the film is Marc Meyers, the young film director who also wrote the screenplay. It is astonishing how he was able to bring such a professional full bodied movie to the screen with enormous sensitivity. He is a filmmaker to watch.

For a very hot summer day in the United States, this was the perfect afternoon movie to feel the much cooler climate of Ireland and the surrounding sea. From the beginning of the movie with the camera on the fishing boat moving slowly in the slightly choppy water, I actually felt as though I were on that boat, feeling a bit of the tossing of the water. The story unfolds quickly with Syracuse bringing in his net to find the body of a woman who says her name is Ondine. Colin Farrell earns his nickname, "the Irish Russell Crowe" in this role. He clearly worked to perfect his regional Irish accent to sound like a Cork fisherman. He always appears on camera with the look of a simple Irish fisherman, but make no mistake, he rates high on the hot actor scale in this film.

This is a film that would be appropriate for children, with some sexual content. There are beautiful scenes throughout the movie. All of the actors played their roles in a believable manner. Of course, this being a fairy tale, you have to suspend belief/disbelief for a bit. Just go with the story. This is not an action movie, although there is an element of suspense. It's one that works best for the viewer to look to slow down and leave the stress of the outside world far away from the theater. The only criticism I have that would be negative is with the night scenes and some of the indoor scenes. Some of them were very dark. It was difficult to see the actors clearly. I would have liked to see the 5-7 minute scene that was cut from the film. Otherwise, it's a completely charming film.