Like The Bucket List, except not so preachy
Image Courtesy of IMPawards.com
Director: Mark Pellington
Notable Cast: Luke Wilson, Radha Mitchell, George Lopez
Dealing with the end of your life is something we all view differently. Some embrace what could be on the other side, others choose to ignore it, others overdue things in order to “embrace” life. Henry Poole (Luke Wilson) has his own way: frozen pizza and massive amounts of alcohol. Diagnosed with a terminal disease, he’s bought a small house with the attention of shutting himself in and drinking himself into a stupor long enough to die. Wanting to just be left alone by everyone, fate has different plans for him in the form of a particularly stucco molding. His neighbors are convinced it looks like Jesus Christ. He thinks it’s a stain. As time goes by, the inspired lunacy around him gets him to evaluate his life at that point. Furthering the complications is the beautiful divorcee next door (Radha Mitchell).
And while it’s had little fanfare so far, it’s easily the best independent film of the year so far. The film is a meditation on a man looking at his death in the immediacy, as opposed to the inevitable, and it’s another interesting role for Luke Wilson. Known more for his off-key way of tackling comedy, which is usually his calling card, Wilson takes the same approach to drama as he keeps everything low-key. This is a zany thing happening to him and Henry’s evaluation of his life is the calm in the middle of it all. Henry is at a bad place in his life and we can feel it. Wilson has a quiet strength that keeps the film stable; his instincts from comedy are well honed and they work well in comedy. It’s his best performance since The Family Stone and is easily Oscar worthy.
The film’s big issue, which is the nature of faith, is handled in a classy way. This isn’t a film about God or any true matters of faith; it’s about the nature of faith itself. Henry is a man who has lost his, lost it for some time, and the film is his exploration of the world that seemingly has what he denies. Wilson plays it perfectly, embodying this man facing the sort of situation none of us want to: our own mortality.
It does a lot of other things right, as well. The film, which is laced with humor, doesn’t focus on the abundance of comedy throughout. With a lot of seasoned comedic actors, including George Lopez as a priest, there’s plenty of good humor in the film. It doesn’t take away from the drama, which it potentially could because some of the film’s funnier moments would hold up in a straight comedy, and credit Mark Pellington with the ability to keep the film from languishing in the comedy. The film has a methodical pace as well; Pellington has a history of interesting cinema as well as some of the mid 1990s more interesting music videos too.
Henry Poole is Here may not get the same sort of fanfare that other films have this summer, but hopefully it’ll be remembered come award season.
