Stella solitaria

I just bought this movie on DVD and watched it for the first time in a couple of years, and once again it amazed me. While most scripts stumble recklessly from one hackneyed plot device to another, "Lone Star" flows like a steady, winding river, never letting the viewer see too far downstream. The spine of the film is Sherrif Sam Deed's investigation into a thirty-year-old murder, yet this story is quickly absorbed by many finely scripted subplots and an overall theme on the futility of trying to escape history. While most directors can't help but show off when using flashy camera movement and jumps in continuity, Sayles employs such a subtle directing style that his leaps in time and location are seamless. Sayles fleshes out his script with subplots on racism, national pride, censorship, generation gaps, politics, social revisionism, and on and on. Most directors don't tackle this many topics in a career, yet Sayles juggles them all in one film without jamming them down the audiences' throats. If the subplots in Sayles' "City of Hope" were connected like a series of dominos, here they are gently woven together like a colorful, well-worn Southwestern quilt. The love story between Chris Cooper and Elizabeth Pena is both wistful and steamy. The film's social conscience is compelling. The father/son conflict between Otis and Delmore Payne (Ron Canada and Joe Morton) feels totally realistic. The dialoge is concise and insightful. Fate hangs over every character and every moment. Plus "Lone Star" has one of my favorite "final scenes", one that perfectly sums up the ironies of the film. It is simply one of the best movies I have ever seen.

Ive always admired Sayles as a writer and a filmmaker. His early films (Secaucus 7, Brother from Another Planet) even though they were rough and messy had wit and brilliant acting, but when he gets it right, he gets it right: Matewan and City of Hope are two examples of multi-layered stories with believable three-dimensional people in powerful situations. Lone Star is an amazing film: characters that are on screen for even a few minutes come of as real people, flesh and blood, no cardboard cut-outs here. Great performances from Chris Cooper, Kris Kristofferson, Elizabeth Pena, Joe Morton and many, many more. Taut, funny, thrilling and emotional. Great film by a great talent.

An entrancing yarn that takes place in a small, quiet Texas border town where the memories of two former lawmen, the crooked Charlie Wade (Kris Kristofferson) and the legendary Buddy Deeds (Matthew McConaughey) are slowly resurrected when the remains of Wade are found on an deserted Army firing range by Deeds' son, Sam (Chris Cooper), who is the current town sheriff. Throughout the movie, Sam visits some of the locals and asks each one if they knew what happened to Wade and if Buddy had a role in the murder. Writer-director-editor John Sayles serves up an unpredictable gem here with a great cast that includes Joe Morton, Elisabeth Pena, Frances McDormand, etc., and to me, it seems like nearly all the characters here make sense right up to the end.

The discovery of a skull and a sheriff's badge on a disused military firing range prompts Sheriff Sam Deeds to investigate. Sam has long lived in the shadow of his father Buddy, himself the sheriff at one time. However clues point to the fact that the skull may belong to Charley Wade, the corrupt sheriff who `vanished' to Mexico when Deeds challenged him many years prior. However when Sam begins to ask questions that go deeper than the legends, he finds secrets within the border town that hit very near home.

Having just watched The Hi Lo Country (a modern day western with a sprawling story but focused on one thing), I was put in mind to watch Lone Star again. Lone Star is easily the superior film and is a rich weaving of many characters and stories all around one event. The one event is the uncovering of an old murder (possibly) and this central investigation holds the attention easily. Within this investigation and the lives that Buddy affected we are shown a lot of subplots – some followed through, others just giving us enough background to understand the characters. All of these work very well and as a result you don't feel like the film is wandering when it moves away from the investigation by Sam. The subplots are so well translated that we are given a lot of back story to complex characters in a very short time.

For the script to be able to create so many characters that feel real and that have meaningful things going on is impressive. That it makes them all work is amazing and is due to Sayles both writing and editing. As director he is great as well, avoiding the washed out desert feel many `Mexico related' films have and instead goes for richer colours that reflect the rich mix of communities that are in his story.

The acting is faultless all round. No one actor stands out regardless of screen time simply because no one goes over the top and everyone realises they are playing part of a story – even Cooper (realistically the nearest thing to a lead actor) plays it down rather than taking the film over. Morton is good even if his character is the least connected to the investigation, McConaughey is strong despite being little more than a cameo, likewise with Kristofferson. McDormand has a small role but is very impressive as Deeds' ex-wife. Elizabeth Peña, so often dumped with almost token Espanic roles is given a real good part and works with it well. I could list them all, however if any one person stands out it can only be Sayles himself – he takes all the strands and brings them together. I watched a 90 minutes comedy earlier the same day that had dragged. At 130 minutes this simply flew – it is that engrossing.

Overall some will find it too slow, too character driven, sadly some will just not sit through a good story if that's all there is to it (all!). I think this was reflected in poor box office at the time (comparatively poor anyway). But those who have seen it will generally love it – if only more people would watch it! A final word on the film – the ending is shocking and sensationalist on paper and a lesser man would have made a big deal out of it. Sayles simply ends the film softly and leaves us the audience to take what we will from it. Low key from start to finish – I can't praise it enough.

John Sayles is not only a great director, but he is also a truly great writer, and "Lone Star" is simply one of the best-written films of all time. Out of the 30+ scripts I studied in script analysis classes, this was, other than "Manhattan", the most interesting, involving, evocative screenplay I read during that period, and probably the one with the most depth. I saw the film a few months after reading its screenplay, and found that it far surpassed the mental image I had in my head of the film.

"Lone Star" could have been a standard mystery. It could have been a 'modern Western', or it could have been a superficial race drama, but it is none of those things (at least not exclusively), it is a fascinating, subtle look at race relations in Texas, as well as at basic human nature. Unlike the contrived writing one would find in an 'Oscar bait' drama film, Sayles' interwoven plots don't feel forced simply because he sets them up so well. The depth and scale of the writing here is remarkable, especially because the film, with all its subplots and characters, never feels cluttered or unnatural. This is a character study of the highest order, and there's no point in discussing the actual events of the film further because this is a film that is best seen (or, indeed, read) with fresh eyes, and I'd hate to spoil that for readers who haven't seen the film.

It's a sad fact of life that directors like Sayles, who see films as stories that must be told, and direct them well, but without intrusive and obvious stylistic quirks, are less noticed than directors who practically beg for attention. That's not to say that this film is not well-made, because anyone with any sort of experience with technical details of cinema could tell you that it is a very well-shot and very well-edited film with excellent use of music. That said, this film is ultimately about the writing, and the acting, and both are absolutely superb, the standout from the latter category being Chris Cooper, who gives what is probably one of the nineties' best performances in this film.

10/10