Beautiful Ohio (IFC, 2008)
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Chad Lowe has long suffered being the second banana to his brother and his ex-wife. Even though he won an Emmy for his work on ABC’s Life Goes On, (in which, let’s face it, he was second banana to Corky and Kellie Martin), he’s never gained the attention he deserves as an actor. Perhaps this is why he has stepped behind the camera to direct shorts and episodic television. With the confidence he gained from those endeavors, Lowe moved on to movies and his feature directorial debut, Beautiful Ohio, comes out on DVD November 25th. The coming-of-age drama is a strong effort in which Lowe handles both the big-name stars and the unknown actors who star in the film.
Indeed, with William Hurt as one of your central characters, any novice director would run the risk of losing control and having Hurt walk away with the movie. But that is not the case in Beautiful Ohio. Hurt slips into the ensemble seamlessly and actually betters the performances of everyone around him.
The film is set in Cleveland, Ohio, circa 1973. The protagonist is William (Brett Davern), a young boy lost in the shadow of his mathematical genius brother, Clive (David Call). As the film opens, Clive has drifted away from his family; the weight of being a genius has begun to bear down on him. For Clive, math is just something he sees does, he does not believe he is amazing. Meanwhile, his parents gloat over him and the neighbors are endlessly impressed. Still, William’s mother (Rita Wilson) does her best to place the spotlight on William as much as possible. I have never seen Wilson perform as nicely as she does in this movie. He face wears the pain she feels for her younger son and the anger she has toward her husband well. And when she speaks, it’s with a quiet reserve. In this film, the mother is the glue holding the family together and Wilson does an excellent job.
William Hurt is the patriarch of the family and in many ways, he’s as lost as Clive and William. A veteran of war (presumably Korea), he has settled on selling insurance for a living. As he sees the world changing around him and feels that his life is standing still, Simon is desperate to feel alive. Whether it’s listening to Clive’s MC5 records, flirting with his gorgeous, younger neighbor (an effective, albeit underutilized Julianna Margulies) or trying dope for the first time, Simon is like a character lifted from an Arthur Miller play and tossed into a 70’s counterculture movie. Despite the anger bubbling under the surface though, Simon still has a great deal of affection for his boys. In particular, the scenes between Simon and William are funny and moving. (more…)
