In America | Review

Jim Sheridan’s tear-jerker wears its heart on its sleeve.

Destination? New York. Purpose of their stay? To start a new life. It’s the heart of the world, the land of opportunity for thousand of immigrants each year and trying to make it in a place where the welcome mat isn’t necessarily welcoming is this four family unit from Ireland. With only the clothes on their backs and the pennies in their pockets, they try to give some sense to their lives which was dealt an unkind life script perhaps by the one being who’s name is as often worshiped as it is cursed at. This film captures the beauty of the human spirit, displays the burden of guilt and is brilliantly told through an unlikely film hero. You can see the care he puts into his projects, a simple look into his filmography demonstrates that this film is no exception. In a powerfully written screenplay, In America is a film that breathes life into film, sheds a special light on the city that never sleeps all in a slowly paced drama that takes its time and very little time to win the viewer over.

The loss of a young child, it’s probably the worst thing that could ever happen to a parent during the course of a lifetime. This deeply rooted film is based on the very personal, true-life experience of one family’s move to the big apple; surprisingly it is a shared experience which was co-written by writer-director Jim Sheridan and his own two daughters.

In America is about starting over and about finding a little piece of heaven in a place called Hell’s Kitchen. You’d think that an Irish family would have the luck of the Irish; unfortunately, some people in the four unit family still refer to themselves as a fivesome. Wishing upon a star is the film’s narrator brilliantly spoken in the words of an older sister who guides her younger sister and carries the load of her emotionally wrecked parents Johnny (Paddy Considine – 24 Hour Party People) and his ghostlike existence and mother, Sarah (Samantha Morton – Morvern Callar). I’m not sure how the casting of the two sisters came about, but Sheridan casting of real-life sisters Sarah and Emma Bolger proves to be quite the insight. Told through the point-of-view of a child, the characters of Christy and Ariel authentically capture the essence of the simplified world that they live in, they understand the pain in which the family is going through, they understand the disconnection which is occurring in front of their eyes and easily adjust to the rat infested, pigeon-homed apartment in a drug-infested building. The city of New York and the troubled downstairs neighbor both come to represent the outer sometimes not-so-friendly carapace before the inner warmness appears. This view of the world is carried over into many p.o.v shots where Christy’s camcorder acts as a voice which explores her world as she sees it and which borrows into the imaginative of the three wishes that her younger brother bestowed upon her.

With a hand-held camera and plenty of close-ups we get into the frame of mind of the ten year-old protagonist and through her eyes and her camcorder recordings we get a little back-story showing moments of joy which seem like a rare occurrence for the family. It seems the older you are the more people complicated their emotions become and this is shown in the two parents who spend more time struggling, than actually healing. But there struggle is viewed as a benediction to downstairs neighbor played by Djimon Hounsou (Gladiator), it’s the eighties, E.T is the hit film, the man is sick, you do the math.

One powerful line of dialogue that shows that the youngest understands the difference between home and heaven, her brother Frankie as she understands it is among the clouds simply breaks the viewer’s heart but it describes the insight and understanding that a child might have. Sheridan’s approach is magnified by offering the film’s voice through the eyes of a child and the chemistry between the two sisters makes many of the natural moments feel authentic.

While Hollywood has the knack for over-complicating human tragedy and triumphant with sentimental layers, here, Sheridan continues on the same track that My Left Foot and In the Name of the Father bore, bringing the viewer to the core of the matter, exploring the emotional weight of the situation and dealing his cast of players with a fate which brings both the bad and good and by offering the film in a tone which is both comedic and dramatically multifaceted.

What particularity works well for the film are a bunch of bright small moments as witnessed in the idea of lemon drops as the cure to everything, a sequence where a beat-up air conditioning unit is brought up a million flights of stairs to relieve from the New York heat and when the patriarch of the family is a quarter shy from buying a sorely needed appliance piece. The sight of a new born child holding tight onto both parents’ fingers shows the same determinism which is felt throughout the film and in itself explores the preciousness and fragility of life. If the scene showing a little girl sing her heart out (similar to resonance found in Whale Rider

) doesn’t move you then you might want to check if your heart is still beating. In America is the Coup de Coeur of the year.

Rating 4 stars