LA
WEEKLY, November 1-7, 2002
REVIEWS YOU REQUESTED -- "TULLY"
Tully
(Anson Mount) lives with
his father and younger brother (Bob
Burrus and Glenn Fitzgerald)
on a farm in Great Falls, Nebraska, the kind of town where the
highlight of the day is getting fries at the Tasty Treat. Tully
is college-age, but he's not much interested in the larger world
and would rather stick around, bedding the local beauties and
waiting to take over the farm he loves. What he hasn't realized
is that his father is having money troubles that trace back
to Tully's mother, who died years ago, leaving behind some disturbing
secrets.
Tully
is a lot like his father, who's grown fearful of deep emotion,
but who, by movie's end, allows it to sweep over him, making
it possible for Tully to do the same. This is writer-director
Hilary Birmingham's
first film, and it's a lovely thing, as reserved and unfussy
as its characters and, like them, full of surprises. Tully and
his potential soul mate, Ella (Julianne
Nicholson), don't do much - they swim in the pond or gaze
at the stars from the hood of his car, swapping romanticized
childhood memories.
Their
seemingly casual conversations are artfully designed by Birmingham
and co-writer Matt Drake
(adapting a short story by Tom McNeal) to reverberate against
other talks, in other scenes. Cinematographer John Foster (Sunday)
appears to have used no artificial light and makes a stroll
home across a farmyard illuminated by moon glow the most enviable
walk in the world.
Originally scheduled for release in 2000 and then sidetracked
to a brief Sundance Channel run after two different distributors
bailed, Tully deserves this big-screen moment, as do its actors.
The power of their performances, which are remarkably unaffected,
comes not just from the force of their speech, but from the
intensity with which they lean in close to one another and listen.
(Music Hall; UA Pasadena Marketplace; Town Center 5; Fallbrook)
