The Clearing

source: The Clearing

The Clearing

It's definitely a wonderfully thoughtful and engrossing film that leaves a very strong imprint on the viewers. Robert Redford, Helen Mirren and Willem Dafoe give three engaging and rewarding performances in this carefully constructed frame. It got nothing of the usual vulgar melodrama and gets to describe the whole situation in a flawlessly realistic way. It was obviously difficult to handle such a dramatic subject showing things happening before, during and after the kidnapping but without taking the risk of being banal. In "The Clearing" they made it, telling the almost not existing American dream (beautiful family, wealth and so on) turning into a living nightmare.

I was watching this movie and everything reminded me of the Gerrit Heijn kidnapping in the Netherlands in 1987. I even regognised the road and the bridge where the murder took place. It is near Wolfheze in the woods, just next to the A12 highway from Utrecht to Arnhem. I could find no credits anywhere and only one mention on Wikipedia. I can only suspect the family never gave permission for this movie. And I believe they are right. All the characters are flat and there is no depth in them. This movie could not hold my attention and I think it was a waste of time on three great actors. We have a Dutch saying: Shoemaker stay with your own tools, meaning you should always stick with what you do best. This is so true for Pieter Jan Brugge. A good producer does not make a good director

My wife and I saw this movie at the Sundance Film festival and were very entertained with it. A wealthy businessman played by Robert Redford is kidnapped by a loser played by Willem Defoe. This is a very low key movie that lets the suspense build slowly until the climax. The characters are realistic and the plot is believable. Screen play has some twists which were not overdone. Robert Redford and Willem Defoe were both at their best. Wife's part played by Helen Mirren was one of the most difficult emotionally and she showed an outstanding performance. Overall the cast's acting was very good. If you like sophisticated thrillers you shouldn't miss this one.

Wayne (Robert Redford) and Eileen Hayes (Helen Mirren) live a comfortable upper class life in Pittsburgh high class suburb. They have two grown children (Alessandro Nivola, Melissa Sagemiller). Then Wayne disappears. He's been kidnapped by former employee Arnold Mack (Willem Dafoe). The FBI investigates which reveals Wayne's ongoing affair. Eventually Arnold demands a ransom. The movie lacks the normal intensity. It's filled with a lot of the inbetween moments. It's a style that keeps the tension simmering at low. There are great actors here and it's fascinating to see them interact. There is also a timeline split going on. It's a great idea but it needs some more thought on its execution. This movie just needs greater intensity.

What appears to be an intriguing and well-acted movie is totally spoiled for me in an instant when Wayne strangles Arnold in an attempt to escape (at 1h 10min in the movie), then turns his back on him so that the semi-dead Arnold can 'surprisingly' come to life again, immediately finds his gun somewhere down in the mud pool, and regains control of the situation. Whatever realism or credibility the director has built in the past hour, is for me immediately lost in that scene. Why do (US?) audiences always put up with the crappy idea of 'the killer suddenly coming back to life again', and why do directors always make heroes look the other way when they make this happen? What an unforgivably cheap trick. For this reason only, my rating falls back from 8 to 5.

Redford, Mirren and Dafoe could read a seed catalog and make it fascinating, so this beginner's exercise in suspense and character is not a dull film if you keep that in mind; Roger Ebert mentioned that he could not see the conclusion coming--it was evident to me in the first ten minutes, the set-up with life-styles certainly leading the plot development: the worker bee on the public bus and the king of the hill with his swimming pool and doting wife neatly contrasted from the get-go. Because this is not primarily a violent film, but a character study, some may find the close-ups and studied manner of worried wife Mirren dull, but it is really the screenplay that needs some intensity and tension as the two men square off in the woods; their chatter is oddly pedestrian. There are moments worth watching here, but The Clearing fails to fully deliver on its promise

After all of the negative reviews I read about this movie, it was with reluctance and groaning that I agreed to watch it when my wife picked it out. I fully expected a bomb. What a pleasant surprise. "The Clearing" is, as many have pointed out, a slower moving film. Just because there is no action does not mean a film is bad. "The Clearing" is a drama with two story lines moving along in parallel. There is interesting dialogue building up to an uncertain climax. "The Clearing" held my interest and developed suspense. With an only 90 minute running time, I kept wondering how they were going to wrap everything up. And that is the strength of this movie. It is not formulaic. You will not guess the ending. All of the loose ends in both plot and character development come to a conclusion in the final minutes. All in all, much better than expected and well worth renting. 7/10