Winter's Bone

The cold bite of a winter's day seeps into the very pores of the tiny drama Winter's Bone and the feeling is there to stay. Set in the poverty-stricken Ozarks area of Missouri, the movie shows a world perpetually trapped in icy decay. It's an impressive visual tone captured by director Debra Granik and cinematographer Michael McDonough, but I cannot help but express some disappointment that the chilly effect extends to the story's dramatic core. It's like the movie's heart is wrapped in ice, which prevents the neat and tidy conclusion from striking a meaningful chord.

The movie does rise above its frozen emotions, thanks to the expertly nuanced and bravely restrained performance by Jennifer Lawrence. She is the best thing the movie has to offer and she never wastes a moment of her screen time. Lawrence plays Ree, a 17-year-old high school dropout tasked with raising her younger brother and sister while her mom sits in a nearly comatose state in the living room. Her dad's been languishing in prison for a while now, having been slammed with charges of cooking meth, which appears to be a considerably common activity in these parts.

When the local sheriff visits Ree's home and informs the teenage girl that her dad posted bail by putting up the family house for bond, the girl, fast graduating to womanhood, is forced into an even tougher situation than usual. The sheriff claims that if Ree's father doesn't appear for his court date a couple days later, then the house will be taken away and Ree's already precarious life will be tossed into utter turmoil. Since her dad has seemingly disappeared and the sheriff seems to be on the verge of abandoning his search, Ree sets out on her own journey to find her father.

It's a solid setup, made all the more intriguing by the nasty characters Ree must contend with on her journey. Everyone in the close-knit community seems to know something, but none of them are talking and they're not afraid to threaten the teenager to get their point across. Lawrence really shines in these scenes, because we see the fire in her eyes that is necessary to this hunt. She has soft features and is plagued by youthful fear deep inside, but she also carries the burden of responsibility with great courage and optimism.

Lawrence makes Ree a fully developed character who straddles the divide between child and adult. She acts like a parent to her kid siblings, walking them to school, teaching them how to cook, and illustrating how to hunt for squirrels (promptly followed by a squirrel-skinning lesson). But she's still a teenager with hopes and dreams for the future and she feels those slipping by. What is most amazing about Ree (and the steadfast way in which Lawrence plays her) is that she never blames anyone from her family for the hardships she must endure.

All we know about Ree's dad is that he cooks drugs and goes to jail for it. All we know about Ree's mom is that she "went crazy" and now sits there by herself, staring off into space with either too few or too many thoughts rattling around in her head. Both parents have essentially abandoned their children and Ree is forced into a role that would be difficult for anyone to take on, let alone a 17-year-old. And yet she never seems to resent her parents for the life they've left her. She simply bears the burden and refuses to give up.

This steely attitude makes Ree a very interesting and unexpected protagonist, which is why Winter's Bone ultimately works. Lawrence is great in the role and she has a significant presence on the screen. But at a certain point, the narrative undergoes a focal shift and Ree's journey slips out of her hands. Things start happening to her and the pieces start falling into place and she only needs to sit back and wait for the mystery to be solved. Once the shift occurred, I found my interest in the plot begin to wane.

It is as though the character of Ree simply stops progressing. When she's struggling to find the truth all on her own, there's a feisty frustration that boils to the surface and we see her stuck in a difficult situation from which she must find an exit. But she eventually becomes little more than an innocent bystander in her own journey. Everything is wrapped up rather neatly and Granik's cold-as-death approach to the narrative kills the dramatic potential of the plot.

The various pieces of Winter's Bone are quite impressive (the acting is top-notch, the photography is carefully controlled, the music is subtle and true to the tone), but the movie's overall effect is rather forgettable. The utter decrepitude of Ree's world is haunting in its own way, but it's also strangely alienating. Granik shows us the Ozarks through a chilly lens and her approach is too clinical to achieve an authentic emotional connection.

Due to the performance by Jennifer Lawrence and some solid supporting turns, especially by John Hawkes, who appears as Ree's shady uncle, Winter's Bone emerges as an interesting portrait of a very dark corner of the world. I like the bare-bones simplicity of the conflict. I like seeing cold weather defined almost entirely by a grungy colour palette (there's hardly a single image of snow in this movie). I like that Ree is such a strong female character. But in spite of all that I like, I can't help but feel that I'm too safely removed from the dramatic meat on this Bone, too numbed by the cold to be touched by its frozen heart.