Image courtesy of www.impawards.com
Director :
Ridley Scott
Cast :
Russell Crowe”¦”¦”¦.Max Skinner
Freddie Highmore”¦”¦”¦Young Max
Albert Finney”¦”¦”¦.Uncle Henry
Tom Hollander”¦”¦”¦.Charlie
For all his faults as a person, from throwing phones at hotel personnel to the other various off camera incidents that have framed his career, Russell Crowe stands as one of the best actors working in the world today. His abilities as an actor have never been in dispute, it’s always been his mental state that’s more perplexing. For someone who is as talented as he is, Crowe’s “prima-donna” persona has left a lot to be desired but one thing keeps him as one of the top stars in Hollywood: his continued selection of great movies to star in. Films like Gladiator, A Beautiful Mind, Cinderella Man and Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, all heavily decorated with various awards and honors both as a picture and for Crowe individually. Having captured an Academy Award for Best Actor with Ridley Scott in the aforementioned Gladiator, Crowe teams up with Scott one more time for A Good Year.
Crowe stars as Max Skinner, a man who inherits a vineyard from his Uncle Henry (Albert Finney) and a dilemma. Does he sell the place, located in the lush French countryside, and make a tidy profit off of it? Or does he keep it and embrace the few good memories of an otherwise negative life?
It’s an intriguing set of questions that mark a remarkable journey of redemption from a life that perhaps doesn’t deserve it. Observing Skinner in the wheel-house of his current life as the manager of a group of stockbrokers, it’s easy to dislike the man from the start. He has a disdain for professional relations with his competition as well as a rather flexible set of moral and ethical rules of behavior by which he lives his life. He has no problem setting up a junior associate to take the fall in order to keep his job secure, nor does he have a problem with having an assistant tell a one night stand an obvious lie so he won’t have to speak to her again. But, much like the maturity of a bottle of wine, Max learns and grows throughout to the film as to what his life has become over what others have wanted for him. Henry wanted his land, and his vineyard, to go to Max as a sign of love. Henry and Max have a father-son relationship that neither ever truly expressed to one another and it takes Max the sum of the time he spends in the French countryside to figure this out.
While it has been said that perhaps Russell Crowe wasn’t the best fit for the role, as that seems to be the sum of judgment against the film, it isn’t that Crowe is necessarily wrong for the part. It’s just much different than the roles he’s synonymous with. Previously he’s been a man of action, one who talks less and uses his physical prowess as the sum of his persona. This is a role that allows Crowe to use more of his non verbal communication abilities while allowing him to be more of an actor as opposed to merely being a presence; Crowe is one of the best actors working today for a reason, though sometimes it isn’t noticeable due to the physicality of many of the roles he’s taken on. He makes it easy for someone to dislike Max in the beginning, and yet his sheer charisma and ability to use a good script enable the perception of the character to come around to a more likeable one by the end of the film.
It’s also interesting how Scott uses the character arc of the film to develop Max Skinner, the person. Scott is working with an actor he obviously has a great rapport with, which admittedly makes things easier, but Scott takes an interesting approach in developing his lead. Interspersing the present with flashbacks to the past, he develops the character by slowly developing the memories Max has about his Uncle’s property. It would be easy to do it in one fell swoop in the beginning, or lazy writing to mention it once and just make it an assumption, but the script and Scott deftly handle the situation by making young Max (Freddie Highmore) and Uncle Henry (Albert Finney) an integral part of the story. Seeing young, naïve Max juxtaposed next to an older, more ruthless version of him gives a good perspective to the proceedings.
It doesn’t hurt that perhaps the best child actor working today is in the role. Highmore has been terrific in several roles as of late, matching the venerable Johnny Depp in Finding Neverland in 2004, and it’s interesting to see him on the same screen as another great actor. Highmore doesn’t look out of place, or pandering for the ‘cute’ factor, like many child actors try to do. He’s a serious actor in a serious role, trying to keep up with Russell Crowe, and Highmore holds his own as the younger version of Max Skinner. There’s innocence and naiveté to him as a youth that one can only imagine was turned on its head as he grew into adulthood.
Mesh in with the usual solid choices of music placement, as well as some wonderful cinematography, and A Good Year is another classic film from one of Hollywood’s most underrated directors.
