Imaginary Heroes
Matt Travis was a legendary swimmer at age 15. He was his dad (Jeff Daniels) pride and joy. But we never meet Matt because the movie opens with his suicide. Yet Matt’s memory is kept very much alive by a father who refuses to acknowledge his lesser son, Tim (Emile Hirsch) walking through life like it’s a bad dream. This dysfunctional family’s mother (Sigourney Weaver) turns to marijuana and partying with all the sarcasm she can muster. And in the midst of their turmoil, lies a secret that slowly builds to the surface and threatens to tear the family apart. But, we don’t seem to care because they don’t. Their turmoil never includes one ounce of dialog about the dead son. If the death of a child is the worst fate of all, one would never know it in watching these narcissistic people focusing on their own inner demons. Instead they escape by one police induced escapade to another, without ever examining their character’s emotions. By the time a colleague woke me up in the last five minutes of the movie, I discovered the final plot twist to be neither stunning nor interesting in validating the suicide. I had hoped for a genre similar to the brilliant “Ice Storm” or “Ordinary People”. What I got was neither. No wonder Matt Travis killed himself. That was validation enough.
Matt Travis was a legendary swimmer at age 15. He was his dad (Jeff Daniels) pride and joy. But we never meet Matt because the movie opens with his suicide. Yet Matt’s memory is kept very much alive by a father who refuses to acknowledge his lesser son, Tim (Emile Hirsch) walking through life like it’s a bad dream. This dysfunctional family’s mother (Sigourney Weaver) turns to marijuana and partying with all the sarcasm she can muster. And in the midst of their turmoil, lies a secret that slowly builds to the surface and threatens to tear the family apart. But, we don’t seem to care because they don’t. Their turmoil never includes one ounce of dialog about the dead son. If the death of a child is the worst fate of all, one would never know it in watching these narcissistic people focusing on their own inner demons. Instead they escape by one police induced escapade to another, without ever examining their character’s emotions. By the time a colleague woke me up in the last five minutes of the movie, I discovered the final plot twist to be neither stunning nor interesting in validating the suicide. I had hoped for a genre similar to the brilliant “Ice Storm” or “Ordinary People”. What I got was neither. No wonder Matt Travis killed himself. That was validation enough.