Synopsis: ANEMONE explores the complex and profound ties that exist between brothers, fathers, and sons.
What We Thought:
You might as well pencil in Daniel Day-Lewis for a Best Actor nomination for Anemone, his return to acting after 8 years away. The film is from his son, but as always DDL gives the role every bit of his soul.
As for the film itself, somewhere in it there is a fantastic movie. Along with Day-Lewis it also stars Sean Bean as his brother and Samantha Morton as the mother of his child and current wife of Bean. So to say the acting is top-notch is an understatement. Bean and DDL spend the majority of the film together as Bean’s character finds his reclusive brother to try to sway him to see his son. Bean is very good opposite DDL.
My major issue with the movie is the supernatural elements in it. The flick is about a former British soldier (DDL) who hides out because of an incident in his past involving IRA members and an explosion/death. He lives alone in the middle of the woods away from the world. When his son finds himself in trouble, Bean goes to visit his brother to see if he’d come back. It’s a pretty heavy story if you know about The Troubles in Ireland and the UK. Unfortunately Ronan Day-Lewis adds supernatural elements that add nothing to the film and did not work for me. There’s a hail storm scene that will remind people of the raining frogs scene in PTA’s Magnolia. There’s a spirit woman that visits DDL in bed. There’s a white horse/ghost creature that I interpreted as the Pale Horse in the Bible, but who knows what it means? That stuff felt out of place in the heavy drama that was was being acted out of this world.
Even though Anemone doesn’t quite work for me, I can’t wait to see what Ronan Day-Lewis does next. Sure, having your dad, who happens to be one of the greatest actors of all-time, in your movie helps raise the bar, but stylistically the film is stunning. Day-Lewis paints a heck of a picture with his camera with some drop dead gorgeous filmmaking. There are shots that are just beautiful and the kid has a future behind the camera with or without his dad. Daniel Day-Lewis will land an Oscar nomination as usual and I could see Sean Bean getting some buzz as well, I just wish the movie was more straight forward and cut the supernatural aspects.
Directed by: Ronan Day-Lewis
Written by: Daniel Day-Lewis & Ronan Day-Lewis
Producers: Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner
Executive Producers: Daniel Day-Lewis, Brad Pitt
Cast: Daniel Day-Lewis, Sean Bean, and Samantha Morton
The Nerds Templar 