Junebug


Synopsis
A sophisticated New York art dealer quickly meets and marries a Southern transplant, George (played by Alessandro Nivola). During an excursion to see an undiscovered artist’s work, Madeline (Embeth Davidtz) gets to spend some quality time with her new in-laws in North Carolina.

Observations
Warning: this movie wins the award for most obnoxious opening sequence. Have the mute button handy on your remote and you’ll be fine. There is already many reviews that do a good job taking about the dichotomies at work in this film; urban v. rural, family v. non-family, so I won’t do that. But I will mention Amy Adams – she’s a spitfire! For the first part of the film I was a little confused how this actor was nominated for best supporting actress Oscar this year. But hang in there; she ends up giving a surprisingly faceted performance. If you are already a fan of The O.C., this part wasn’t much of a stretch for Benjamin McKenzie. He can certainly work the surly angle.

I was disappointed in Alessandro Nivola’s role. The script doesn’t call for him to do much more than wander around town being the nice guy. I would have like to have seen some sort of confrontation between his character and Johnny (Benjamin McKenzie), but I guess as in life, familial relationships don’t always play out the way you think they should.

“Junebug” comes from the nickname that Ashley (Amy Adams) would like to give her baby when it’s born. I wondered if that was significant in light of the ending of the film. Let me know what you think.

Rating:
Amazon's entry for Junebug