jamesfilmore

In this superbly rendered drama from Mary Stuart Masterson, two small-town families find their lives unexpectedly intertwined when the quiet, socially awkward Beagle Kimbrough (Aaron Stanford) invites the romantic attentions of Georgia Kaminski (Kristen Stewart), a young girl with a rare but terminal nervous disease who knows her window of opportunity is rapidly closing. Much to the chagrin of her domineering mother, and the chilly audits of her otherwise zesty grandmother, Georgia decides to follow her feelings to wherever it is they lead her. Meanwhile, Beagle's older brother Guy (Jayce Bartok), the wayward son, returns from a dead-end bid to become a musician and struggles to reconcile himself with estranged father Easy (Bruce Dern) the town butcher, whose wife (Guy and Beagle's mother) has recently passed away.

There are so many points in this movie where a less steady hand might have foundered the effort, either by overplaying the sentiment card, or by trying to hard to push the tragic undertones, but the film finds an immaculate balance, that golden middle-of-the-road equilibrium that just gets rarer the more time goes by. The characters are so genuine, their stories so real, that the film exacts an impact that is no less raw, and no less memorable, than the trials and tribulations of families we know in life.

The first scene offers a perfect illustration of everything that's right with the movie: Beagle and Easy sit across from each other at the breakfast table, Easy contemplating such bold measures as changing his breakfast cereal, Beagle listening, responding in monosyllables, almost without thinking, and from this one tiny encounter we glean the whole spectrum of what their relationship has become – perfunctory, habitual, and void of energy.

With writing this precise, and with performances so nuanced and natural that all of Hollywood's clichés are swept under the carpet without so much as a whimper, the stage is set for perfection.

Which is what this movie is – perfection.

I take issue with my fellow reviewer, who complained about the movie being "in your face." While the film lacks a certain subtlety, that doesn't change the fact that a sad majority of modern moviegoers don't get what a film is trying to say unless it spells everything out to them in alphabetical order. Go subtle and everyone misses the boat, and they scratch their heads and wonder just what in the world they spent the last two hours watching. What's the value in that? Moreover, harping so hard on the film's mode of presentation implies that the theme of a movie is subordinate to its form, when in fact it should be the other way around. It's one thing to tell a good story, to make it flashy and tastefully packaged, and quite another to give it something to rest on; an idea that's perfectly timed, perfectly handled, perfectly memorable.

Thematically speaking, "Gardener of Eden" is powerful in the extreme. Amidst a nation gone wild over terrorism, war, and global disaster, the movie takes a step back and reminds us that the greatest threats to society are, and always will be, domestic; that as long as drug dealers can set up operations outside of a high school, and as long as the legal structures of society condemn the individuals who try to stand in their way, the problem will remain systemic. It will never go away.

In targeting the extent of this issue – this cultural illness, if you will – Gardner of Eden offers not only a scathing critique of the apathy at the root of society, but also a rousing call to action for all those inclined. It's moving, poignant, and darkly humorous, and bears many a viewing, a fresh discovery pending with every push of the "play."