Falling Angels

Falling Angels, based on the novel by Barbara Gowdy, is one of the most effective family dramas to emerge in a good long while. Set at the end of the 1960s, the film follows the Field family through their trials and tribulations over a particularly tumultuous couple of months. Mother Mary (Miranda Richardson) spends the majority of her day lying on the couch, hopped up on pills to deal with her depression – while dad Jim (Callum Keith Rennie) uses his military background to run his household. Their three daughters have problems of their own: Lou (Katherine Isabelle) is a rebellious sort who’s just begun a relationship with a draft dodger from the States; Sandy (Kirsten Adams) has also started seeing someone, a sleazy shoe salesman (played a little too convincingly by Mark McKinney), and honestly hopes to settle down with him; Norma (Monte Gagne) is the outcast of the family, with her extremely low self-confidence and fixation on their dead brother. Not surprisingly, Falling Angels doesn’t contain much in the way of plot – that’s par for the course with movies of this type – but the characters are so compelling here that it’s barely noticeable until the very end (which goes on a bit longer than it should). Director Scott Smith has a keen eye for ’60s details (the film feels authentic, from the Volkswagen minibus that Lou’s boyfriend drives to the old-school TV commercials that can occasionally be glimpsed), and he’s assembled a pitch-perfect cast. Rennie surely must’ve been tempted to channel Robert Duvall’s tough-as-nails Great Santini character, but he manages to turn Jim into a far more complex figure. His good intentions rarely wind up the way he hopes (a routine Scrabble game turns into an awkward spelling battle between Jim and Lou), mostly because he refuses to see things from his wife or daughters’ point of view. The only weak link is Miranda Richardson’s Mary; the character isn’t developed to the extent where we understand her indolence. Jim’s behavior would indicate that Mary’s been forced to withdraw completely from the world, but the screenplay never really allows us to get under her skin. Still, that’s a minor complaint for a film that’s otherwise surprisingly moving and emotional.

*** out of ****