LIMBO (Screen Gems) Starring: Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, David Strathairn, Vanessa Martinez, Casey Siemaszko, Kris Kristofferson. Screenplay: John Sayles. Producer: Maggie Renzi. Director: John Sayles. MPAA Rating: R (profanity, adult themes) Running Time: 126 minutes. Reviewed by Scott Renshaw.
In my review of John Sayles' 1996 film LONE STAR, I wrote that my initial frustration with the film must have meant that I missed something. Such was my confidence in Sayles' storytelling that I was convinced I could find the unifying thematic thread if I just pondered long enough. In that particular case, I was right. Sayles' new film LIMBO presented me with the same initial frustration, and the same determination to find the one piece that would turn the merely intriguing into the truly brilliant. And it just wasn't there.
For the first hour, there are plenty of reasons to believe LIMBO could be the latest thematically rich cinematic Sayles novel. The setting is Port Henry, Alaska, a remote fishing town in the Southeastern islands. Among the residents is Joe Gastineau (David Strathairn), a former fisherman turned jack-of-all-trades after a long-ago trauma. He becomes interested in new arrival Donna de Angelo (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio), a singer who has her own problems dealing with moody teenage daughter Noelle (Vanessa Martinez) and a string of bad romantic choices. As Joe and Donna grow closer, they begin to break out of their protective shells and face their demons.
As he has with the settings of most of his recent films -- THE SECRET OF ROAN INISH's coastal Ireland, LONE STAR's Texas border town, MEN WITH GUNS' unnamed Latin American interior -- Sayles turns LIMBO's Alaska into a character as carefully drawn as any of the people. Here, Alaska has at least two faces: the raw, blank-slate wilderness that provides escape and opportunity for new beginnings, and the tourist attraction that provides a sanitized version of that wilderness. Sayles offers plenty of local color with his supporting characters, but it's the way those characters interact with the place that gives LIMBO weight. For half the film, LIMBO sets a tentative romance against a backdrop of civilization trying to claim one of the few remaining frontiers, even as residents who should know better keep searching for a predictability that just isn't there.
I suppose you could see the second half as Sayles' attempt to show just how far civilization has to go, if you were feeling particularly generous. An abrupt twist in the proceedings finds our three principal characters in trouble, stranded on an uninhabited island after a botched drug deal by Joe's hustling half-brother Bobby (Casey Siemaszko). The metaphorical connections to the three characters' respective troubles are a bit too tidy -- Joe has two people to save after being responsible for two deaths, Donna is stuck with a guy she can't run from, and Vanessa has to confront her sense of isolation. Even worse, the links to the first half's portrait of Alaska at a cultural crossroads become tenuous at best. The second half is solid enough, but it's a jarring shift. Instead of a novel, Sayles has written two short stories slammed together in an uncomfortable fit.
John Sayles' films are always comparative pleasures in the bigger picture of filmmaking, with their smart dialogue and attention to human detail. Strathairn, Mastrantonio and Martinez all do fine work, with Mastrantonio providing the added pleasure of performing her own songs in a beautiful smoky voice. Sayles has also become a more visually interesting director with every film, turning in at least one hypnotically beautiful sequence of Joe returning to fishing (another triumph for cinematographer Haskell Wexler). He can say fascinating things both with his dialogue and his camera. In LIMBO, all those fascinating things just don't add up to a fascinating, unified story. LIMBO isn't a disappointment because he doesn't say enough, as in the ambiguous final shot. It's a disappointment because he tries to say too much.
On the Renshaw scale of 0 to 10 overbaked Alaskas: 6.
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