Affliction

The harsh, tough Northeastern winters of New Hampshire seem an appropriate backdrop for the father-son protagonists in this film. The story is about physical abuse and how it propagates. Paul Schrader wrote and directed the film. It's based on Russell Banks' novel by the same name and it reminds me of a similar relationship between tough, hard North Country characters and their harsh environment in the novel, No Great Mischief by Alistair MacLeod.

James Coburn plays the father, Glen Whitehouse. He won an academy award in 1998 as best supporting actor in this role. Nick Nolte is Wade, the son whose life is used to demonstrate the psychological effects of his violent father. Willem Dafoe is Rolfe, the younger son, and the narrator in the film. They were backed by Sissy Spacek as Wade's girl friend, Marge, May Beth Hurt as Wade's ex-wife, Lillian, and Jim True as a hunting guide, Jack.

I liked Nolte previously in Prince of Tides and Cannery Row. He's a good actor, although his career seems checkered with alcohol and drug problems. Coburn (deceased 2002) was dramatic as the mean-drunk father, but Coburn's career was full of rough and tumble character parts ever since The Magnificent Seven in 1960, so it's type cast. He was good, but I didn't think his performance was award quality. Nolte convinced me he was screwed up, irresponsible and as the narrator told us, ``living on the edge of his emotions.'' Both actors were consistent in their characters, although it seemed to me that Coburn was enjoying it and Nolte was working at it.

I remembered Dafoe as Jesus from The Last Supper of Christ and recently as the bad-ass Green Goblin in Spider-Man.

I thought the flashback camera work was effective in this film. It was done like a home video, with problematic focus, jerky camera motion and amateurish tracking. I was annoyed at the narrator analyzing Wade's psychology for me. It was very much like a writer `telling' instead of `showing' you the scenes and actions.

The film is an interesting character study of emotional damage. You can see it in the callous, violent father and in Wade's suffering and his acting out. Nolte portrays a Wade who is caged by his emotional baggage while Rolfe seems to have escaped to college and gained distance and perspective, although Rolfe did seem to agonize during his conversations with Wade.

I would not call this entertainment in the sense of an escape into fantasy. It's a serious film about a serious subject. If you're ready for that, it's well done.

Reviewed February 22, 2003