Movie Review: "The Descendants"

Yesterday we decided to take advantage of our retired status and headed out to The Waterfront to take in a weekday matinee. The movie we selected was the newly released, highly touted George Clooney movie, "The Descendants." The movie is getting a lot of Oscar buzz, and I can do nothing but add to the praise. This is a really, really good movie.

The movie takes place in Hawaii, where Clooney plays an attorney who controls 25,000 acres of pristine Hawaiian land that the family is planning on selling to developers. At the same time, he is facing a very serious family crisis. His wife lies in a coma following a boating accident, and he is now faced with the responsibility of dealing more directly with his two daughters, age 17 and 10, than he ever has in the past. He admits that he was always the "secondary parent." As he faces the wrenching decision of how to deal with his wife's condition, his older daughter reveals to him a secret about her mother, his wife, that only adds to the turmoil.

This is a movie that is at times both funny and heartbreaking. It points up the fact that no one's life is ever perfect, and how everyone has to deal with the curve balls that life throws at us.

As I mentioned, this movie is getting four star reviews left and right, and the kudos are well deserved. Clooney is getting talked up big for the Best Actor Academy Award. Having recently seen another actor getting similar buzz, Leonardo DiCaprio in "J. Edgar", I will give my vote to Clooney. A young actress named Shailene Woodcock, who plays the older daughter, is excellent, and I would expect her to get a Supporting Actress nomination. Other small but excellently portrayed roles are Robert Forster as Clooney's father-in-law, Beau Bridges as one of his many cousins, and Judy Greer, who's peripheral involvement with Clooney's family is a critical part of the movie.

Another thing that recommended this movie to me was the involvement of Alexander Payne, who directed this movie and wrote the screenplay. Payne had similar duties for one of my favorite movies in recent years, "Sideways" (he won the Oscar for Best Screenplay on that movie). "Sideways" is a movie that I can watch again and again, and I think that "The Descendants" could fall into that category as well.

December is the time when lots and lots of good movies get released, but try to make time on your movie going calendar to see this one. Excellent movie.