• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 548 0

anyone, young or old, who wouldn’t respond to October Sky, yet it was considered a long shot in the commercial marketplace because it’s about teenagers who aren’t cynical. Lewis Colick’s screenplay is based on the autobiography of Homer Hickam Jr., whose life changed when he saw the Soviet satellite Sputnik in the evening sky one night in 1957. Although he was a poor math and science student, he was genuinely inspired by Sputnik and became passionate about rocketry. He banded together with three smart classmates and soon they were building their own backyard rockets.

What gives this real-life story depth and dimension is the surrounding story. The film takes place in Coalwood, West Virginia, where coal is the only business and the local mine is every young man’s destination. Homer (well played by Jake Gyllenhaal, just on the verge of stardom) is the son of a mine foreman (Chris Cooper) who fully expects his son to follow in his footsteps and has no patience for his often-foolhardy experiments. The father could have been played as an out-and-out villain, but the script, and Cooper’s fine performance, make clear that he’s just a stubborn man whose job pressures leave him no room for softheartedness.

Even the encouraging schoolteacher, nicely played by Laura Dern, is defying her principal by urging Homer and his friends to aim high—and escape the dead-end destiny of their classmates.

What could have emerged as a series of platitudes remains grounded by Colick’s script and Joe Johnston’s sensitive direction. But the real lynchpin of this movie is Gyllenhaal’s unabashed—and infectious—enthusiasm as the boy who refuses to abandon his dream.

Best of all, under the closing credits of October Sky we see vintage home-movie footage of the real-life Homer Hickam Jr. and friends as they conduct their rocketry experiments. Cynics please note: Hickam realized his dream and spent his life working for NASA. The reason this heartfelt movie works so well is that it isn’t espousing a hollow sentiment. Hollywood couldn’t have invented a happier ending.

99. OFF THE MAP

(2004)

Directed by Campbell Scott

Screenplay by Joan Ackermann

Based on the play by Joan Ackermann

Actors:

JOAN ALLEN

SAM ELLIOTT

VALENTINA DE ANGELIS

J. K. SIMMONS

JIM TRUE-FROST

AMY BRENNEMAN

Had the filmmakers known that the name of their film would prove ironic—not only describing its characters but the fate of the film itself—they might have sought another title. Nevertheless this absorbing drama gives first-rate actors roles they can sink their teeth into.

The location plays a crucial role in that story, just as it apparently did in the production of the film. New Mexico has mystical qualities that can’t be explained, only experienced, and the movie goes a long way toward capturing that feeling.

Amy Brenneman appears in a framing scene before the story proper gets under way and we learn that she is the central character, now grown up. At the age of eleven, Bo Groden (wonderfully brought to life by Valentina de Angelis) is mature beyond her years because she has had to take on adult thoughts and responsibilities, given that her father (Sam Elliott) is paralyzed by depression and her mother (Joan Allen) has her hands full trying to keep the family together—and fed.

They live so far “off the map” that the Internal Revenue Service has never explored their curious income tax filings until now. A buttoned-down IRS agent (Jim True-Frost) shows up one day, parched by the sun, but instead of carrying out his assignment he becomes part of their extended family. Another perpetual presence in their lives is an old friend of Elliott’s (played by that indispensable character actor J. K. Simmons) who survives on a monthly veterans’ pension and a regular dose of antidepressants. His dry sense of humor fills in a lot of conversational gaps and gives young Bo someone to relate to.

This could be the basis for a short story or sketch, but it makes sense as a feature-length film because writer Joan Ackerman has created such fully developed, if quixotic, characters.