Movies that end with a grieving loss of a family member would finish on a hopeful note expressing that at least the other members of family have come together, and so eventually the grief might wash away. But, we know that grief isn’t a sand castle, stacked on the shore, waiting to be deluged by a huge wave. It is much more complex than that. It could pass on like an infection, maiming & turning us into the living dead. But, at the same time if you manage to rise out of grief, it will transform you into a new, humble person. Irish film-maker Jim Sheridan's “In America” (2002) deals with the grief of a family, who had just lost their youngest family member and is unable to express or talk about the intense sorrow, spreading throughout their heart. How do they start anew among this hovering soul-sickness form the core of this emotionally resonant tear-jerker.
“In America” begins at a point, where most movies dealing
with grief ends. The Irish family of four: father Johnny (Paddy Considine),
mother Sarah (Samantha Morton), two daughters Christy (Sarah Bolger) and Ariel
(Emma Bolger) arrive into New York on tourist visa to have a fresh start. Our
narrator is the matured, contemplative 10 year old girl Christy, who believes
her recently deceased little brother Frankie’s words that ‘she can make just
three magical wishes in life’. Christy, the reserved one, has a camcorder and
records the lives around her, while Ariel is a boisterous 7 year old, who believes
in the magic world to view everyone as friends. When crossing the border from
Canada, the family’s bedraggled car is stopped by the immigrant officers. While
going through the papers, they ask about the 5th family member.
Suddenly, grief pervades the atmosphere as the subject of Frankie comes up.
Right at that time, Christy makes her first magical wish to pass through the
border without facing any tribulations from the officials. The wish fulfillment
happens and the family traverses through the green-hued tunnel to emerge into
the bustling neon-lit streets of New York City.
The children stick their head out of the car, basking in the
aura of artificial lights. Of course, a beaten-down adult may see this setting
as hokey, but this scene plays out from the perspective of children, and so it
retains the magical feeling. The family’s grief and downbeat prospects seems to
be washed off in that ‘cruising-through-the-streets’ moment, but as I said the
averted grief always waits in the dark, getting ready to pounce on us at the
right time. Despite witnessing the glamorous side of Manhattan, the reality
takes Johnny and his family to a run-down apartment in New York’s famous
‘Hell’s Kitchen’. They have junkies and other societal outcasts as neighbors.
Johnny, a stage actor, goes to various auditions. Sarah aims to be a teacher,
but only gets the waitress job at an ice-cream parlor named ‘Heaven’. Along with
repressed grief, poverty and searing summer heat troubles the family. But,
thanks to the enlightening joyous faces & keen eyes of the children, Sarah
and Johnny do their best to find their footing. The little girls also make
friends with a towering, afflicted artist Mateo (Djimon Hounsou). Gradually,
with the help of these gentle souls, the parents learn to say goodbye to the
smothering grief and find happiness in the present.
“In America” is definitely sentimental. Yes, it elicits
emotions out of us, but it didn’t feel manipulative. Barring few hokey moments,
the tears we shed for the characters and their predicament are well-earned. The
sentimental allusions also don’t stop writer/director Jim Sheridan to
profoundly explore the lacerating impact of repressed grief. Sheridan was
accused of tidying up the realities of Hell’s Kitchen, and for construing a
script that’s impractical. “In America” is a timeless fable about coming to
terms with loss and grief. Since, director Sheridan opts to unfurl the story
from the children’ perspective, he chooses a poetic-realist tone rather than
showcasing the stark realism. The children running around the apartment building, riddled with junkers & hustlers, without facing any sense of
danger could be taken as a testament to this poetic-realist tone, rather than a
fatal flaw in the script. The reference to the E.T. character, the snowball
fights, and the ailment of Mateo does turn to be the narrative’s little sappy
moments, but Sheridan at each turn, keeps on revealing great depths about the
characters that we can overlook those inherent flaws.
The story was semi-autobiographical, based on Sheridan and
his family’s own experiences in the 1980’s US, when he worked as a stage
director, before moving back to Ireland to make his critically acclaimed debut
feature “My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown” (1989). Sheridan is said to
have written the first draft of “In America” and sent it to his two daughters
for advice. They brought in the perspective of their 80’s childhood. It lead to
create distinct, polyphonic view points for the characters and the daughter
Naomi & Kristen Sheridan ended up sharing the writing credits alongside
father Jim. If on the paper, the plot seems to threaten to go overboard with
maudlin tones, director Sheridan does his best to keep the humane, oft-kilter
tone. The heartwarming and heartbreaking confrontations between the characters
are the significant parts of the narrative, which is well-written and more
importantly, it was flawlessly staged. In one such sequence, Johnny has an
argument with Sarah about her trying to forget their dead son Frankie and his
inability to feel for his living kids. To which Sarah asks “If you can’t touch
somebody you created, how can you create somebody that’ll touch anybody”. Those
unadulterated words perfectly relate Johnny’s grief with his inability to be
the good actor. Later, Johnny puts on an actors’ face and confronts the dying
neighbor Mateo. Once again, the ensuing conversation reveals a face of the
character, which we aren’t able to perceive previously. The script moves
between loosely built episodes, but those things are gorgeously performed and
staged to lose our interest.
Jim Sheridan recurrently zeroes-in on the contradictory
decisions, the characters make, when they are at end of their tether. Johnny’s
decision to risk everything for a $30 ET doll to gain respect among his kids
and Sarah’s hazardous decision to have the baby for protecting the children are
the examples of those conflicting positions. It might seem ridiculous in some other film, but here it wonderfully gels with the narrative’s whimsicality.
The observations by the children are alternately funny and sad. The scene where
Ariel tells about her loneliness to the parents is so heartbreaking and very
relatable. One of the movie’s well-directed sequences occurs when Johnny and
Sarah conceive another child, while below their apartment the secluded Mateo
slices his hand and dribbles blood onto the canvas. The entire scene is capped
with thunderstorm, and the cross-cuts between lovemaking and Mateo’s rage
indicates how one man’s maddening desire to life is somehow connected to
conceiving and survival of a newly born child (the cross-cuts occurs at a later
stage too).
The performances are uniformly excellent. If the Bolger
sisters (playing Christy & Ariel) are miracle of the movie, Samantha Morton
& Considine serve as emotional anchor. Sarah & Emma give one of the
best child performances on-screen. Their simple observations are radiant
enough. They depict the soulfulness of kids without ever putting in front the
cuteness factor. Paddy Considine infuses the everyman quality to his character
and his gamut of emotions in the final scene would be strongly felt by all, who
fought hard to overcome a loss. Morton’s expressive eyes and lyrical smiles
don’t demand for dialogues to showcase the characters’ inner conflicts. She is
one of the rare actors, who could sell every scene she acts and in this film,
even her fragility has elegance. Djimon Hounsou strikes the right notes as
Mateo, a character which could easily be turned into a stereotype (the
disappointing career trajectory of Hounsou, despite starring in movies like
“Amistad”, “Gladiator” and “Blood Diamond” also tells a lot about Hollywood’s
casting choices).
Trailer
"In America” (105 minutes) is an uplifting film about a
beaten down family’s struggle to overcome obstacles like grief & cynicism.
It puts a touchingly human face to the wise words of ‘how one should not dwell
on the past but look towards the future’. The odd crowd-pleasing sentimentality
may irk those expecting subtlety, but the performances kept on pulling my heartstrings till the end.
