Don Reviews "Anemone"

One of the things I cherished as a child was taking backpack trips into the Bighorn Mountains in Wyoming.  We would go deep into “God’s Country” for a week, truly immersed in nature with none of the comforts of daily life, which made me appreciate things like electricity.  But being in the middle of nowhere for a week also made me appreciate life.  Believe it or not, this actually works its way into my review of Anemone.

Co-written and directed by Ronan Day-Lewis in his debut, this cast includes Daniel Day-Lewis, Sean Bean, Samantha Morton, and Samuel Bottomley.  In this story, Jem (Bean) goes to visit his brother Ray (Day-Lewis), who has been living as recluse in the woods in the United Kingdom for years.  While the brothers have had a distant relationship, Jem is trying to get Ray to come home for a family emergency, which forces them to confront the issues they have had on multiple fronts.

I actually both liked and hated this one.  Even though I liked the core story, it was simply a lot less of a story than it’s over two hours required.  There are so many scenes that were not needed that seemed to just be there for the sake of symbolism, making me think “what was the point of that scene” a number of times.  It is definitely designed for the arthouse crowd, but even that was overdone.  Even though the visuals are well done, that didn’t make up for it.

From an acting standpoint, Bean and Day-Lewis are incredible and even had me wondering if they were related in real life.  The majority of this film is just the two of them, so the performances required of them are that much more important, and they handle that nicely.  There are actually two scenes alone that are worthy of pitching for awards consideration, and the would be more than deserving of them. Since the not-so-good outweighs the good, I will only recommend Anemone to be watched at home on cable.