Stella solitaria

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.

John Sayles is regarded as one of the best independent film-makers about and Lone Star is a film of a man in full throttle. Its a set of interwoven stories set in two time periods as Chris Cooper a border town sheriff who has returned to his home town where his father was a legendary Sheriff investigates a 40 year old murder that may have been committed by his own father. He also rekindles a romance with a childhood, Hispanic sweetheart that his father was very much against at the time.

The film is foremost a murder mystery but also deals with issues of police corruption, illegal immigration, justice, politics and racism. Sayles was rightly nominated for an Oscar for his screenplay.

Chris Cooper holds the film as the dogged sheriff. Kriss Kristofferson and Matthew McConaughey make effective cameos in flashback scenes. There is a strange cameo from Frances McDormand as Cooper's ex-wife who is dealing with mental health issues which probably led to their divorce.

The film is thoughtful, provocative and requires attention. Its not a slam bang or a slow burner. Many multiple stories come together as the past comes to haunt the present and relationships are made clearer.

I live in San Antonio and have been to Eagle Pass (where the movie was filmed) many times. I have watched this movie over a dozen times. It is a wonderful piece of film-making! John Sayles captures a lot in this film. His characters have depth and substance. His portrayals of the role racism has played in Hispanic and African-American lives are brilliant but not heavy-handed. The acting is incredible. The casting was perfect. Frances McDormand as Sam's ex-wife is unforgettable. I agree with another commenter that the camera work was exceptional when Sayles filmed flashback scenes using a single take. I especially liked the scene along the river with Sam and Pilar. I am sure there are some people who don't share my opinion, but this movie is one of my top ten favorites of all time.

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.

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