“Grace is Gone” is excellent in bits, and boasts a fine John Cusack performance. But overall this quiet film is almost too tasteful, too timid, to really register.
Cusack makes his presence known in the opening shot, slumping down a long corridor toward the camera, a middle-aged man in glasses, bad haircut, and a limp. It takes a while to realize this is John Cusack, in fact. His willingness to leave behind his usual energy and humor speaks well for him as an actor, and zeroes in on the character’s core.
He plays Stanley, an ordinary Minnesota man, father of two, whose wife is serving in the military in Iraq. A strong supporter of the war, he is devastated when he gets the news that his wife has been killed in action.
This situation might have gone many different ways, but writer-director James C. Strouse opts for a curious story line. Instead of telling his two daughters about their mother’s death, Stanley whisks them away on a road trip to a Florida theme park.
For a few days, the girls are unaware of anything. Gradually, the oldest daughter, played by Shelan O’Keefe, begins to suspect there’s something Dad isn’t telling them. The other daughter is played by Gracie Bednarczyk; both are extremely good.
The film is arranged around the trail markers of a road movie, which have their usual appeal. In one stopover, Stanley visits his mother’s house, only to find his unemployed brother (Alessandro Nivola) lazing about the place.
The brother is as critical of the war as Stanley is staunch about defending it. This is about as explicit as the film gets in actual commentary on the war; Strouse keeps his focus on the emotional situation within the family.
However, if you infer that Stanley’s retreat into denial is itself commentary on Iraq, then maybe Strouse’s actual point comes through.
Strouse’s previous script was “Lonesome Jim,” an appealing black comedy about a slacker (let’s call it a slack comedy) with a great role for Casey Affleck. Strouse, a native of Indiana, clearly has a good feel for Midwestern culture from the ground up.
It’s hard to say why this never seems to come together completely in “Grace is Gone,” except maybe that the central premise begins to feel sitcom-like after a while. You get tired of Stanley’s dishonesty, despite his intentions.
Incidentally, the touching music score is by Clint Eastwood. Let’s see if this promising newcomer can make a go of it in Hollywood.
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