In my review of The Ides of March, I noted that despite the missed opportunities and overall disappointment with that film, it was still refreshing to see that George Clooney was an A-list actor that made interesting choices in his projects instead of settling for the typical Hollywood blockbuster. His decision to star in Alexander Payne's latest character based dramedy The Descendants is yet another example of this, and thankfully it is a far more successful effort. Freed from the constrains of directing a play adaptation, here Clooney gets to focus solely on his character and the result is one of his best film performances.
You'd think Matt King (Clooney) was living a great life. After all, he has a decent amount of money and is sitting on top of a wealthy inheritance. He has a good job, a wife and two daughters. Also, he happens to live in Hawaii, where he was born and raised. we soon learn in The Descendants that Matt's life is actually in a stunning tailspin. Marital relations have been strained for some time and now his wife has suffered a tragic speedboat accident that has left her in a coma. Now he has to take care of his children, a task he has very little experience at. Further complicating matters is when his rebellious teenage daughter returns home with a secret about her mother.
Alexander Payne has always had a great gift at precise character study and this may be his best effort yet on that front. Matt King makes for a well rounded, fascinating, funny individual. He's got some difficult issues going on and ocassionally goes a bit too far in taking people to task, but the audience is with him the whole time. It's not even simply a case of George Clooney's natural charisma in front of the camera, though that certainly helps, but also Payne (and Clooney's) understanding of how to portray Matt as a complicated everyman that is entirely believable and also supremely entertaining. It's a balancing act and Payne once again nails it.
The film also gets it right with many other characters, with Shailene Woodley's terrific performance as Matt's angry teenage daughter Alex a particular standout. She starts off as a seemingly stereotypical brat filled with teen angst, but quickly becomes her father's biggest ally. The way the film handles Alex's friend Sid is also a welcome surprise, starting off as a typically dimwitted surfer, but eventually shown as a genuinely nice guy who has some surprising depth. All of this is achieved without Payne ever betraying the essence of the character. Robert Forster as Matt's gruff father in law, Judy Greer as a woman he meets on vacation, and Beau Bridges as Matt's cousin all have their own memorable moments as well.
Payne's astuteness for character study and development wouldn't mean much if he didn't know how to tell a story. The Descendants doesn't follow the rhythms of your typically Hollywood plot. It flows naturally, with emotional high and low points not coming at places you would normally see in a narrative. He knows how to end scenes at the right places and take them in directions that you wouldn't expect (a great example is during a meeting with his cousin, where Payne avoids unnecessary melodrama). He even manages to weave an environmentalist theme that never once feels distracting or out of place. Thanks to Payne's refreshing take on characters and plot progression, not to mention his fabulous cast, The Descendants is a funny, emotionally rewarding journey to Hawaii.
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