Tumbleweeds

The other review of this film misses the point entirely. There is indeed tension, of the emotional variety, between daughter and mother. The child is the adult and the adult is child-like. One always hopes for the mother to make the right decision, to turn her and her daughter's life around. The performances are of the highest caliber, as is the writing, and the direction complements both beautifully, never getting in the way of the simple story. Watch this with a parent, a son, a daughter...a rewarding viewing experience.

Janet McTeer's multi-faceted performance makes this otherwise predictable character study a must-see for serious acting buffs. As a native Southerner, I have suffered through more hideous attempts at Southern accents than I care to remember, but McTeer nails the accent right down to the complicated vowel sounds and makes it seem utterly natural. The story runs out of gas in the final third, and the "Winnebago ex machina" element comes out of left field, but why quibble? McTeer is absolutely phenomenal, bringing far more complexity to the role than is written on the page.

A Southern woman (excellent Oscar nominee Janet McTeer) leaves an abusive relationship and hits the road with her young daughter (Kimberly J. Brown) looking for the man of her dreams. Of course though McTeer's dreams are foggy and incoherent when it comes to the opposite sex. She has a love affair with a moronic trucker (director Gavin O'Connor), finds friendship with co-worker Jay O. Sanders and dodges advances from old perverted boss Michael J. Pollard. Shades of Martin Scorsese's "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore" as this is basically a road trip picture for the fairer sex. McTeer is amazing and totally believable as an American from the wrong side of the tracks (she is a classically-trained Brit in reality). The quirky situations and hilarious moments make up for the picture's helter skelter screenplay and prodding tone. 4 stars out of 5.

I must admit that I didn't really look forward to this movie. I mean, a movie with a story about a mother and daughter on the run for an abusive husband, is there a bigger cliché in the history of Hollywood? I really don't think so. This is the stuff bad TV-movies, which have only one intention and that is to make the average housewife cry her eyes out, are made of. I only gave it a try because I didn't have much better to do and was only thinking about watching the first 15 minutes, just in order to be sure that it was one of the many. But guess what, I finished it. That already says it all, but for those who are interested, I'll also explain why I liked it.

Every time her relationship fails, Mary Jo Walker runs from town to town and from state to state with her 12 year old daughter. And every time she promises herself and her daughter that everything will be different this time. Now she will look for a decent man who will love them forever. They decide to go to San Diego. But before they get there, their car breaks down and they need the help of a trucker to fix it. Mom immediately sees a new candidate husband in him, but her daughter already sees what is about to happen. He's the same kind of guy as always, mom will fall in love again and tell that this one is different, but will end up running from him like she has always done. And indeed, that's the way it happens, but this time Ava, doesn't want to leave anymore. She has made friends at school and will soon act in a school play...

Even though this movie was rather predictable and far from original, I admit that I had a good time watching it. The story isn't the reason why I liked it so much, although it could have been a lot worse. The fact that Ava wasn't the 'cute and lovely' kid who will bring her mother on the right track again by organizing a romantic date with a great man sure had a lot to do with the fact that I still enjoyed the story. But in the end it's still the acting that really did it for me. Janet McTeer was really excellent as the runaway mom and together with Kimberly J. Brown, who played Ava, she formed an excellent team.

Overall this is a nice movie that sure is a lot better than what I expected. Yes, I even liked it and no I'm not a middle-aged housewife. It just wasn't too corny and had some very fine performances to offer. That's also the reason why I give this movie a rating in between 7/10 and 7.5/10.

I actually watched this film on Youtube, and it's yet another film that is extremely hard to find on DVD etc in my country, so it's basically a movie that no one has really seen. 'Tumbleweeds' got on my radar due to the Oscar nominated performance Janet McTeer, and that performance is exceedingly good and worthy of a nomination. Kimberly J. Brown who plays the daughter in this film is also worth mentioning as an excellent performance as essentially McTeer and Brown hold the movie together. This movie a mother/daughter bonding movie, directed by Gavin O'Connor (Warrior, The Accountant) who also has a role in the film. 'Tumbleweeds' feels like a low-budget TV movie with Gavin O'Connor yet to perfect his storytelling and craft, but the performances from the two leads hold this movie together. The mother is careless and the daughter is precocious yet they both prove to be realistic characters and mostly likeable. As someone pointed out the comparison to 'Anywhere But Here', which is of the same year and same ilk, 'Tumbleweeds' is the better film by a mile, simply because the characters are actually likeable.

'Tumbleweeds' is worth watching if you want to see Oscar-nominated performances or are into low-budget indie movies, or curious about where Gavin O'Connor started. Other than that, it's perfectly miss-able too! It simply not must-see though.

Considering it's budget and performances; ***½ out of *****!