Meryl Streep Julia Roberts Chris Cooper Margo Martindale Ewan McGregor Sam Shepard
Julianne Nicholson Benedict
Cumberbatch
Juliette Lewis
Abigail Breslin
August: Osage County is a rip roarin’ study
of a family in Oklahoma that is perpetually on a tinderbox. The slightest disagreement can erupt
into a major battle, and the only way they see to keep the lid on is to hide
all their secrets. Of course, this
is a strategy that always fails, but like the good neurotics they are, they keep
using it, thinking it will work.
As the story proceeds, we learn that the cruel parenting we witness
stems from troubled childhoods, and we see it spread like an infection from
parent to child across generations.
As each secret is uncovered, it has an explosive effect on all involved.
On a more elegant note, the ensemble cast is a
study in streamlined acting that continually hums along as if they had worked
together for years and filled out every detail. At the center of the story—and the cast—is the consummate
award-winning actress Meryl Streep, who plays the damaged matriarch in a family
with three grown daughters who have come home to “comfort” their mother after a
crisis. Her sister is present as
well, with her husband and son in tow.
Present as well is the recently hired cook/housekeeper who is a beacon
of sanity in the dysfunctional, turbulent group.
The screenwriter Tracy Letts (Killer Joe) has based the script on his
play with the same title, which premiered on Broadway in 2008. The transition from stage to screen is
not always smooth, but Letts has achieved it without a hitch. Most of the action takes place in the
family home, a beautifully landscaped colonial mansion in the countryside near
a lake, or in the cars of the arriving family members. Clues about the underlying conflicts are
seen from the beginning in the interactions between Violet (Streep) and her
husband Beverly (Sam Shepard), followed by the arriving sister Mattie (Margo
Martindale) and husband Charles (Chris Cooper) and each of the daughters’
families. In the process of the
unfolding drama, the viewer experiences the trapped feeling that each of the
characters suffers from; at one point, a character says to another who is
running away, “Where are you going?
There is no place to go!”
And we feel trapped as well because the action is so powerful. Also because, in a larger sense, we
identify with the fact that we are always a part of the family to which we
belong; there is not ever, really, any escape.
John Wells, the director, has performed his
function of creating a work of art from all the components of the film, with
the actors and other crew, such as the cinematographer Adriano Goldman and
musician Gustavo Santaolalla, whose work illuminates the ongoing drama.
Clearly August: Osage Country
will be prominent in the upcoming award circuit soon to take place.
Grade: A By Donna
R. Copeland
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