FINDING FORRESTER (2000) / *** 1/2
Directed by Gus Van Sant. Screenplay by Mike Rich. Starring Sean Connery, Robert Brown, F Murray Abraham. Running time: 135 minutes. Rated PG for mild language by the MFCB. Reviewed on January 20th, 2001.
By SHANNON PATRICK SULLIVAN
Of all the possible choices of career or hobby, writing is hardly the most glorious. It is, in general, a solitary pursuit, the sort of thing on which a person can labour for days, months, even years, and have little to show for it (or, at least, little of true quality). Writers are usually invisible behind their work, and even when an author does have the opportunity to discuss his metier in public, the content of the questions rarely rises above the cliche of, "Where do you get your ideas?"
It is refreshing, then, to have experienced "Finding Forrester", a movie which is not only about an author (in fact, two of them), but which depicts both the joy which comes from writing and the tenacity it demands. It is about much more than that, of course -- it is a coming of age story, and a teacher/student story, and a story about fighting injustice. But whereas director Gus Van Sant's "Good Will Hunting" -- to which "Finding Forrester" bears both notable similarities and enormous differences -- was about a mathematics prodigy but could have chosen any number of other subjects for the title character's expertise, writing is a fundamental component of "Finding Forrester".
Jamal Wallace (Robert Brown) is a black teenager growing up in the Bronx. He's a smart kid, but in order to gain acceptance with his peers, he only does enough classwork to pull off a C average, and instead concentrates his skills on the basketball court. The only outlet he permits his mind is his writing, which he keeps secret. Then two events occur, almost simultaneously, which force Jamal to rethink the direction of his life. First, his top marks on standardised tests invite the interest of a prestigious private school, which offers him a full scholarship and a chance at a very different life. Second, a friendly dare prompts Jamal to sneak into the apartment of a reclusive old man known only as "the Window".
When the Window scares Jamal away, the boy accidentally leaves behind his journals, filled with the stories he wrote. When he retrieves the notebooks, Jamal discovers that the Window has included critical comments on every page. Eventually, Jamal convinces the old man to speak with him face to face, and it turns out that the Window is Robert Forrester (Sean Connery), a Pulitzer Prize winner who wrote "the great American novel" half a century ago and hasn't been seen or heard from since. Forrester reluctantly agrees to become Jamal's mentor, while Jamal tries to penetrate the mystery of what caused Forrester to abandon the outside world.
Much of "Finding Forrester"'s success is derived from the two central actors. Connery is back in fine form after a drought of good starring roles. He captures all the key elements of Forrester's personality: his eccentricity, his paranoia, his tragedy, his innate benevolence, and most importantly, his love of writing. Although this is a role that could easily have been taken to extremes by a lesser actor, Connery never indulges himself. Consider the scene where Forrester finally emerges from his apartment only to panic when he finds himself alone in the midst of a bustling crowd. Instead of playing up character's response, Connery keeps his reactions subdued; he makes us feel Forrester's anxiety, rather than forcing it down our throats.
Newcomer Brown proves to be a real find, his performance here at least as much of a breakout as Matt Damon's was in "Good Will Hunting". Brown brings an extremely natural feel to the film; I have no idea what his background actually is, but he certainly made me believe he had grown up in an environment not unlike Jamal's. Despite the fact that Connery has decades more acting experience, Brown is a good match for the veteran performer, holding his own in scenes of considerable emotion and power.
The screenplay by Mike Rich is a tremendous piece of work, an excellent example of how economy in writing leads to a better product. In between the lines of the central storyline about Jamal's relationship with Forrester, Rich slips in a number of secondary tales -- Jamal's efforts to fit in at the private school (epitomised by a not-so-friendly rivalry on the basketball court), his budding romance with rich white student Claire (Anna Paquin), his difficulty maintaining ties with his friends from his old high school, and his need to decide between writing and basketball as his true passion. During the movie, I started to fear that some of these threads would go underdeveloped, only to discover as the credits rolled that this was by no means the case. Rich tells each aspect of the film in perfect measure, for the most part neither leaving his subplots stillborn nor dwelling on them any more than necessary.
It's not all perfect -- one major storyline, in which Jamal is accused of plagiarism by a jealous teacher (F Murray Abraham) who doesn't believe a basketball player from the Bronx could possess such talent, is a little too familiar. The way it plays out recalls the denouement of "Scent Of A Woman" and many other films; it's a surprising concession from an otherwise highly creative movie. Paquin's character also goes slightly astray in the picture's closing minutes, as the subplot about her and Jamal never really reaches fruition. It's as though one last scene between them was accidentally omitted from the final cut. This is a particular shame because Paquin, as usual, gives a bright and energetic performance.
But whatever the faults of the screenplay, they are minor, and more than compensated for by Van Sant's excellent direction. There is an unusual liveliness to "Finding Forrester", and this is particularly impressive given the static nature of the subject material. Van Sant gives Forrester's lessons a palpable verve. It's enough to make you wonder why all English teachers can't be this passionate, and why they aren't all this successful at communicating that passion to their pupils.
Copyright © 2001 Shannon Patrick Sullivan. Archived at The Popcorn Gallery, http://www.physics.mun.ca/~sps/movies/FindingForrester.html
_______________________________________________________________________ / Shannon Patrick Sullivan | "We are all in the gutter, but some of us \ | shannon@mun.ca | are looking at the stars." - Oscar Wilde | \___________________________|__________________________________________/ | Popcorn Gallery Movie Reviews www.physics.mun.ca/~sps/movies.html | | Doctor Who: A Brief History of Time (Travel) /drwho.html |
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