Why I Saw It: The Academy Award nominations didn't hurt. Beyond that, chatter about Bruce Dern's performance have damn neared reached fever pitch.
Cast: You've gotta love a cast as filled with character actors as this. Bruce Dern is the big takeaway here and he is rightfully who everyone is talking about. I'm afraid I haven't seen him anything else I can recall so I'm having a hard time not thinking "well, they needed a feeble old man so they found a feeble old man for the role". He is good in that he's so pathetic. Will Forte was the real surprise for me, less that he can be this good and more because I never assumed he'd get a role like this. None of the weird SNL entertaining is present. He is restrained and dour. He seems utterly exhausted the whole time, like life has beat him down but there's no point in giving up. June Sqibb is funny. I don't know if I'd go much beyond that. Bob Odenkirk has a small role and let's out a few more of his mannerisms for it. Most of the rest of the actors are familiar faces who I couldn't name if I tried.
Plot: It probably says me about me than anything but I found this movie incredibly depressing. It's a simple story. Woody (Dern) is an occasionally lucid old man who thinks he's won a Publisher's Clearinghouse-type prize and is hell bent on getting to Lincoln, Nebraska to collect his $1,000,000 dollars. David (Forte) is his son who guilts himself into agreeing to take him. On the way, they spend a couple days Hawthorne, Nebraska, where Woody grew up and most of his family still resides. From there, it's about slowly learning about Woody's past and present situation. It turns out, he hasn't kept a lot of friends, or at least no noble ones. It is a dreary picture though. Something about small towns bum me out. Most of the building are empty and everyone there has depressing lives. I'm not sure if it was the intent, but numerous times scenes played like the characters were delivering lines. The cadence of the conversation is so filled with pauses that it was unnatural to listen to. I assume this was intended in the direction but I found it jarring and made me pay closer attention to the screenplay than I should've.
Elephant in the Room: Why is it in black and white? I'm guessing that was a choice made to add to the dour atmosphere of everything. Maybe to save money. I don't know how that part works. I didn't mind it as much as I do with some movies. It made it all feel forgotten which is appropriate for the setting.
To Sum Things Up:
In general, I don't get Alexander Payne. Sideways is a movie that I still struggle to understand. Election is a bleak, darkly funny movie, sure, and The Descendants is well acted even if the story meandered a bit much for my liking. I accept that Nebraska is well made although, as I mentioned, the pacing and delivery of the dialogue bothered me. Dern and Forte put in great performances. I wasn't a big fan of this movie. The subject matter itself and overall tone is so uncomfortable for me, and I didn't take away enough thematically to justify the mood it put me in.
Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend
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