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Review - Straight Story

I am generally not given into too much emoting and stuff when I watch movies. But, it was this movie that really created that lump in my throat feeling.

To start off, Straight Story is a pretty simple movie. An elder brother makes a difficult (considering his age and financial situation) journey to mend fences with his ill brother.

Unlike many other preachy movies about relationships and stuff, this movie just presents situations that the elder brother encounters along his journey. Situations which, if you are a traveler, would encounter.

The directory, David Lynch, strikes a chord with his viewers, extracting simple, nothing flashy and very effective performances from his crew. In fact, the screenplay is again devoid of any relationship jingoisms or any other overtures, and instead, concentrates and presenting realistic situations to the viewer. Note the situations where the lead actor bargains over the repairs done to his tractor.

This movie was based on Alvin Straight's real life story. Richard Farnsworth plays the role of Alvin Straight and to put it simply, provides a magnificent performance, literally living out the role. Sadly, it looked like he has reserved his best for the last. This was his last movie, before he passed away committing suicide.

Particularly touching were the last few scenes where it becomes really hard to dismiss this movie as "Just another movie".

K.Shyam

Posted by Unknown at 9:50 PM