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HALF
NELSON
Ryan Gosling’s stellar performance
in Ryan Fleck’s directorial debut,
Half Nelson, is reminiscent
of that of a young DeNiro. However, Gosling’s
award-worthy performance is not the only
great acting in this realistic, inner-city,
cinema-verite film; Shareeka Epps, one
of Dan Dunne’s (Gosling's) students,
plays a tough, street-smart teenager older
than her 13 years, and Anthony Mackie
gives a seamless, understated performance
as Drey’s (Epps's) surrogate father.
Fleck and
Anna Boden, who wrote the screenplay (Boden
also edited the film), avoid Hollywood’s
cliché of an inner-city teacher
making a difference with a neatly wrapped,
sentimental, ending. Dunne,
a thirtyish history teacher in a Brooklyn
school, rebels against the required text
and instead teaches in an off-the-cuff,
impromptu way. As coach of the girl’s
basketball team, he inspires the players
and pushes them to their limits. But his
noble intentions and imaginative teaching
are undermined by his secret—he
is addicted to drugs. Drey’s home
life is a stark contrast to Dunne’s
affluent upbringing. A street-wise kid
who hides behind a tough exterior, she
lives alone with her mother, visits her
brother in prison, and has a surrogate
father in easygoing drug dealer Frank
(Mackie). But both Dunne and Drey are
loners who have built barriers around
themselves for personal protection—Dunne
hiding his drug addiction and Drey concealing
her vulnerability at not having a father.
They recognize their own weaknesses in
one another, which is why they want to
protect each other. It is this simple
act of human kindness that is the strength
of the film.
Like Half
Nelson’s characters, the film
itself is flawed. At times it suffers
from uneven editing and too many close-ups,
more a reflection of a small budget and
short shooting schedule than Fleck’s
direction. However, the film’s original
script, realistic portrayal of real life,
and dynamic performances--especially Ryan
Gosling's--make this small independent
movie captivating to watch.
James
R. Janowsky
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