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Thursday, July 14, 2016

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com ARTS

‘Captain Fantastic’ an 
endearing look at life

FILM REVIEW

Sundance film takes a 
look at what it means 

to be a parent

By DANNY HENSEL

Daily Arts Writer

Say what you will about the 

hyper-commercialization of film, 
Marxist cinema is still alive — 
at least in a 
limited 
way, 

living 
as 
it 

would in an 
American 
capitalist 
society: 
on 

the 
fringes. 

In 
“Captain 

Fantastic,” 
a 

family 
that 

ascribes 
to 

these same values also finds itself 
removed, by choice, from the 
grasps of mainstream society, 
settled in rural Washington.

At the head of the Cash family is 

Ben (Viggo Mortensen, “A History 
of Violence”), a man who, with 
his wife, has propped up a remote 
settlement to teach their children 
about life in a way a standardized 
education could not. They exercise 
daily, hunt for their own food and 
read constantly. The Cash family 
has established an intellectual 
utopia 
to 
create 
“philosopher 

kings” of their children — in which 
the word “interesting” is banned — 
anyone who expresses an opinion 
is invited to explain it to open ears 
and celebrations of Christmas 
are left by the wayside in favor of 
Noam Chomsky Day, to honor the 
beloved linguist.

When Ben’s wife dies, the 

dynamics of the family change 
considerably, forced to enter and 
confront 
American 
society 
to 

attend her funeral. This proves 
quite the challenge for the Cashes, 
who pride themselves on their 
intellectual and physical strength. 
As Bodevan (George MacKay, 
“Pride”), the oldest child, cries in 
frustration to his father, “Unless 
it comes out of a book, I don’t 
know 
anything!” 
Bodevan, 
or 

Bodie for short, may be able to 

parse between “Trotskyite” and 
“Trotskyist” 
while 
declaring 

himself as a Maoist, but he is far 
from competent at talking to girls. 
The five other children, whose 
names—Kielyr, 
Vespyr, 
Rellian, 

Zaja and Nai—are meant to signify 
their 
unending 
uniqueness 
in 

the world, also struggle to adapt 
to 
their 
surroundings. 
Only 

Rellian 
(Nicholas 
Hamilton, 

“Strangerland”), 
a 
rebellious 

tween, expresses anger at his 
father for bringing the family out 
to the western wilderness.

“Captain Fantastic” is, above all, 

a master class in emotions, a study 
of how actors can remain human 
even when their characters are far 
from relatable. Individuals who 
live in the forest and are taught to 
hate organized religion, schools, 
medicine — really anything at all — 
are few and far between, yet the six 
children are so believable at their 
core, so dedicated to their father’s 
teachings that it’s impossible not 
to sympathize with them when 
their grandfather threatens to 
take custody. Ben is a complex 
and rather compelling character 
by default, but Mortensen brings a 
dedication and heightened intellect 
to the role that flashes when 
he speaks his rather non-flashy 
dialogue. Frank Langella (“Frost/
Nixon”) plays Ben’s father-in-law 
with gravitas, bringing a quiet yet 
looming and brooding presence to 
the film’s chief antagonist. Kathryn 
Hahn (“The Visit”) and Steve Zahn 
(“Dallas Buyers Club”) blend in 
perfectly as supposedly “good” 
and “responsible” parents who 
have subscribed to the American 
consumerist parenting guide en 
masse that the Cash family so 

despises.

Though, the film can stumble 

when it succumbs to, instead of 
subverting, easy choices. Bodie’s 
cultural blank spots are taken to 
their logical extreme — literally 
being unable to speak to a girl when 
he sees her or, later, proposing to 
wed a girl after meeting her that 
day. He may have only read books, 
but surely they had protagonists 
wait before proposing marriage. 
The symbolism is also a bit too 
pronounced. 
The 
family 
only 

listens to classical music and the 
film dispels with a typical film 
score for something more rustic, 
so, of course, “My Heart Will Go 
On” from “Titanic” blares through 
the speakers in a grocery store. The 
family drives around in a converted 
school bus, painted green and 
retrofitted like an RV, a clear 
allusion to the family’s unorthodox 
translations of what happens in a 
typical American household and 
life.

Yet, ultimately, the film is a 

success because it’s unafraid to 
explore and often defend the 
family’s 
experimental 
living. 

Writer and Director Matt Ross 
(“28 Hotel Rooms”) clearly did his 
research, diving into the worlds of 
Noam Chomsky and the Slovenian 
philosopher Slavoj Zizek, whose 
theory of over-identification as a 
strategy to upend societal norms 
clearly 
informed 
the 
family’s 

method of scaring cops away from 
arresting Ben. The line is repeated 
continuously throughout, but it’s 
ultimately true: “We’re defined 
by our actions, not our words.” 
We may criticize our society to 
no end, but Ross has actually 
shown us what we could be. 

BLEECKER STREET

When you pull up to the function all fitted

‘Night Of’ dread 
and misfortune

By ALEX INTNER

Summer Managing Arts Editor

If you look at HBO’s drama 

offerings beyond the massive 
hit that is “Game of Thrones,” 
you’ll find a 
pretty 
bar-

ren 
cabinet. 

While 
“The 

Leftovers” 
has 
criti-

cal 
acclaim, 

it’s 
ratings 

are not near-
ly 
strong 

enough 
to 

anchor 
any-

thing on its own. The upcom-
ing “Westworld” has been in a 
tumultuous 
development 
and 

production cycle for years now — 
either a sign of creative turmoil 
or a struggle to find what they 
want the show to be. And, most 
embarrassingly, HBO rolled back 
its season two renewal of “Vinyl” 
after realizing the massive cre-
ative revamp the drama would 
need wasn’t worth their resourc-
es. So, this year, they were forced 
to give their summer drama slot 
to a smaller miniseries that has 
also been in development for a 
while (originally intended to be a 
vehicle for the late, great James 
Gandolfini, “The Sopranos”, who 
retains a posthumous executive 
producer credit), a show that 
wouldn’t usually be thought of 
as a network anchor. The move 
seems to have paid off from a 
business perspective, as the 
drama premiered to significantly 
higher ratings than last year’s 
“Show Me a Hero.” Creatively 
speaking, “The Night Of” is 
HBO’s best series premiere since 
“Hero,” as its slow build of a story 
hooks you in a slow and painful 
manner.

“The Night Of” ’s premiere 

follows a night gone horribly 
wrong. While Nasir (Riz Ahmed, 
“Nightcrawler”) is on the way to 
a party in his father’s cab, Andrea 
(Sofia Black D’Elia, MTV’s adap-
tation of “Skins”) gets in. She 
leads him on an adventure across 
town before bringing him home 
for an evening of drugs and sex. 
However, when he wakes up in 
the kitchen, he walks over to 

the bedroom to find her brutally 
stabbed to death and blood every-
where. He runs, but is caught by 
the police for an unrelated crime. 
Brought to the station, the police 
find the murder weapon on his 
body and proceeds to question 
him about the crime (which he 
has no memory of), at least until 
lawyer Jack Stone (John Turtur-
ro, “The Big Lebowski”, in a role 
originally planned for Gandol-
fini) shows up and starts to help 
Nasir.

The episode unfolds this story 

methodically across its hour-
plus runtime. It takes nearly a 
half-hour for Nasir’s full encoun-
ter with Andrea to play out. As 
it continues, the sense of dread 
builds. The show is completely 
aware you know something bad 
is going to happen to them, and it 
uses that to build a palpable sense 
of tension. As Nasir gets arrested 
for a completely different act, you 
know they’re going to figure out 
he was at the scene of the mur-
der (in fact, the cops who arrest 
him are called to the scene while 
he’s in the car and bring him to 
sit in the car outside of the build-
ing he just left). It plays with your 
knowledge of what happened 
and made me physically uncom-
fortable in the best way possible.

By the end of the first episode, 

we have no idea where this story 
is going. Heck, we don’t even 
know if this is a case of mistaken 
identity or if Nasir committed the 
murder when his memory falters. 
In this case, we’re as in the dark 
as the main character, and it’s 
going to be exciting to see how 
the series deliberately unravels 
its story. While a single minise-
ries is not enough to come close 
to securing HBO’s drama future, 
“The Night Of” gives hope that 
the pipeline might not be as bar-
ren as reported. 

A

The Night Of

Miniseries 
Premiere

Sundays at 10 p.m.

HBO
A-

Captain 
Fantastic

Bleecker Street

State Theatre 

on July 22

Its slow build 
of a story hooks 

you

 TV REVIEW

