Alexander Payne’s ‘The Descendants’

George Clooney plays Matt King, a Hawaiian lawyer who is responsible for his family’s valuable land inheritance - hence the film's title. His wife has suffered a water skiing accident and is in a terminal condition on life support. Matt and his two daughters, Alexandra and Scottie, have to cope with this tragedy. Also, Alexandra tells Matt that her mother had been having an affair. He has to come to terms with this, rebuild neglected relationships with his daughters and complete the land deal.  The Descendants is based on a first novel of the same name by a Hawaiian writer, Kaui Hart Hemmings (she appears in the film briefly as King's secretary).

Payne’s Sideways (2004), filmed in the photogenic Californian vineyards, didn’t make me want to drink pinot noir, and The Descendants would not induce me to go to Hawaii. One of the underlying themes is that even if something looks like paradise, life there can be as harsh as anywhere else. Moreover, much of this a paradise long lost to rampant development.

Alexandra, very well-acted by Shailene Woodley, undergoes too rapid a transition to be credible from teenage tearaway to maturity after being brought back from Napoleonic exile at boarding school on another island. Also unlikely is Matt’s acceptance of Alexandra’s non-negotiable boyfriend, Sid. His presence is invaluable, though, to the mechanics of splitting up the father daughter trio essential for some of the scenes to work.

In fact, all the acting was good. Clooney has an Oscar nomination and seems to be the type of superstar who can bring out the best in other actors. Indeed his acting skills and personal attractiveness probably make one overlook some of the film’s weaknesses. For example, too much voice-over (by Clooney) as a consequence of avoiding flashbacks, too much Hawaiian music and some dodgy editing – what was the grave (bottom left when they approach the inheritance on Kauaʻi) going to be about? The film, to my eyes, doesn’t really merit a nomination; Clooney’s own Ides of March is better, certainly better shot.

Before seeing this film, it might help those of us ignorant of US geography and history to look at Wikipedia’s entries for Hawaii and the Hawaiian Islands.  I never knew the Hawaiian state flag incorporated the UK’s Union Flag, or that Captain Cook called them the Sandwich Islands.  The film provides maps to assist. 

Anticipointment Index – the publicity has been rather flattering, so not a good mark at 3 (out of 5, the lower the better).

George Clooney’s ‘The Ides of March’

George Clooney has directed four films and has written the screenplay for two of them. I haven’t seen Leatherheads (2008, US pro-football) or Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002, TV producer who claims to be a CIA hitman) and suspect I may not have missed too much. But I liked his 2005 film, Good Night, and Good Luck, which he co-wrote and acted in, and gave an account of Ed Murrow’s stand against McCarthyism in the 1950s.

In The Ides of March, which he directed and co-scripted, Clooney plays a Democratic presidential candidate, Governor Morris, during the Ohio primary (presumably in March) which is essential to his selection. The other key characters include his experienced campaign manager (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and a younger, clever but naïve staffer (Ryan Gosling). The plot follows the staffer’s unsentimental education as to the nature of politics and politicians. I thought it very well-acted, had high quality cinematography, was more insightful than Primary Colors and, reassuringly if you aren’t obsessed with American politics, was less nerdy than The West Wing. The play, Farragut North, on which The Ides of March is based, took its title from the Washington Metro station on the Red Line. It serves the area where the think tanks and political lobbyists have their offices, hence the references in the film to K Street.

Don’t be put off by the fact that on 31 October John Prescott (former British deputy PM) tweeted that he thought The Ides of March was the best film he’d seen this year. This led to a response from Alistair Campbell (@campbellclaret):

Agree with @johnprescott Ides of March terrific film. Clooney good but Ryan Gosling and Philip Seymour Hoffman top drawer.

Something to ponder after seeing the film - surely Campbell isn’t so vain as to be jealous of Gorgeous George, who I thought turned in a well-nuanced performance as Morris? Or are the Gosling/Hoffman characters the ones he identifies with most? Or has he seen too much behind the front of good-looking actor-politicians ? I thought that Evan Rachel Wood’s portrayal of the out-of-her-depth young intern was very convincing (she was the ditsy Melodie St. Ann Celestine from Mississippi in Woody Allen’s Whatever Works).

In France, The Ides of March has been released as Les Marches de Pouvoir - The Steps of (to?) Power. Les Coulisses du Pouvoir (The Corridors of Power) was the French title of Sydney Lumet’s film Power released in 1986 – all about a political consultant in an Ohio senatorial election … Now a cliché, ‘corridors of power’ (probably on John Rentoul’s Banned List) was first used by C P Snow in 1956, but his Strangers and Brothers novels, although certainly constituting a roman fleuve, don’t seem to have been translated into French.