![]() ![]() I was not quite as ready for the solution involving the bear, not after seeing " Grizzly Man" and remembering Werner Herzog's scary narration: The "blank stare" of a bear, he says, reveals not wisdom but "only the half-bored interest in food." While it is reasonable for bears to want to be free, it may not be reasonable for humans to want to live close to free bears. How they deal with it is not original, but it is sincere and the actors are convincing. Until they deal with it, they can't get on with things. Then we realize the death has put Einar, Jean, Mitch and Griff all on hold. The unfinished life in the title at first seems to refer to Einar's dead son. Sooner or later the matter of Gary will have to be settled. Now he lurks around town, intimidated even by the two old men on the ranch, one of them an invalid, because wife-beaters by their nature are cowards. We can almost see what Jean almost saw in him. Gary on the other hand is a psychopath whose gearbox includes a setting for charm. But he is captured and sold off to a shabby local zoo, so that yokels can stare at him through the steel mesh of a cage. The bear (played by Bart, who had the title role in " The Bear"), is more likable, because after all he behaves according to his nature. The four characters seem to be stuck, and then they're budged by the arrival of two predators: The bear comes back, and so does Gary the boyfriend. Freeman never seems to be playing anything he sees what he sees. It's not often noted, but Redford plays anger well. The local sheriff ( Josh Lucas) is not indifferent to the arrival in a small town of a good-looking woman. It is a foregone conclusion, I suppose, that Einar will eventually unbend enough to love Griff, who after all is his son's child, and true also that Mitch is the ranch's reservoir of decency. She doesn't want to be at the ranch, but she has no choice her latest boyfriend, Gary (Damien Lewis) beats her, and she has fled from him. Griff ( Becca Gardner) is Einar's granddaughter.Įinar thinks he hates Jean. These men are essentially awaiting death together when they get visitors: Jean (Lopez) is the widow of Einar's son, who was killed in a car crash a dozen years ago. Mitch was mauled a year ago by a bear, and is an invalid, given a daily needle of morphine by Einar. ![]() So has its owner, Einar Gilkyson (Redford) and his longtime ranch hand Mitch (Freeman), who lives in the little house behind the bigger one. The story takes place on a rundown ranch outside Ishawooa, Wyo. And give Lopez your permission to be good again she is the same actress now as when we thought her so new and fine. If you're convinced that "An Unfinished Life" is damaged goods, how can it begin its work on you? If you think Freeman is channeling the relationship he had with Eastwood in " Million Dollar Baby," reflect that this movie was made a year earlier. An Unfinished Life was adapted from the novel of the same name by Mark Spragg.Sometimes you are either open to a movie, or closed. But old trouble makes its way back to town in two ways - Gary tracks down Jean and wants to make her pay for leaving him, while the bear who attacked Mitch comes down from the mountains looking for new prey. Einar reluctantly takes in Jean and Griff, giving them a place to stay as Jean looks for work and tries to put her life back together. Jean has become involved with a violent man named Gary (Damian Lewis), and seeks refuge on Einar's ranch for the safety of her daughter, Griff (Becca Gardner). Einar once had a son named Griffin, but he died in a car wreck while Griffin's wife, Jean (Jennifer Lopez), was driving Einar never forgave her for the death, and he had never met the granddaughter she was carrying until she arrived at his doorstep 11 years later. Now on the wagon, Einar looks after what's left of his spread with his friend Mitch (Morgan Freeman), a one-time cowhand who never fully recovered after being mauled by a bear. Einar Gilkyson (Robert Redford) was a once successful rancher whose spread went to seed after he developed a serious drinking problem. Two generations of a damaged family are brought together in this emotional drama. ![]()
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