The tragedy which sets up the entire film happens very early on in the story. Coming home from a family outing, 10-year-old Josh Learner (Sean Curley) steps outs of the family’s car and wanders onto the road in front of a gas station. Though he’s only there for the briefest of moments, it’s long enough for a Ford Explorer driven by Dwight Arno (Ruffalo) to hit and kill the child before his family even realizes he’s missing.
Dwight the driver and his son Lucas (Eddie Alderson) were rushing home from a Boston Red Sox game so as not to further upset his ex-wife, Ruth (Mira Sorvino), by returning at such a late hour. Dwight pauses, then drives away from the accident scene, leaving the boy to be found dead on the shoulder of the road by his father Ethan (Phoenix), mother Grace (Connelly), and sister Emma (Elle Fanning, looking more and more like Dakota each day).
Mark Ruffalo and Eddie Alderson star in Reservation Road.
© Focus FeaturesThe Bottom Line
Although we’ve seen this type of film before, the set-up is initially interesting and there are relationships to explore and psyches to analzye a plenty in Reservation Road. Why does Dwight drive away? Why can’t Grace and Ethan find any common ground over which to mourn the loss of their son? But the story never goes anywhere after establishing the basics about each lead character. Ethan’s angry and out for revenge. Grace is sad yet willing to work past her grief in order to give her daughter as normal a life as possible. Dwight, after fleeing the scene, sort of tries to do the right thing but then chickens out. The death wears on his conscience, yet it’ll take him the film’s entire running time to do anything about it. In the meantime, he’ll wander through the days in a haze while Ethan’s anger escalates.
Whoever thinks screaming and crying can legitimately replace well-written dialogue delivered in realistic situations is way, way off. However the screeching of various characters isn’t even the film’s major downfall. No, Reservation Road is jam-packed with scenes that simply don’t work and logically make no sense. When Dwight asks his young son if he wants pie (as in pizza) for dinner, the next scene shows them at home eating with chopsticks. When even the little things aren’t right, it’s tough to stay with the story. A police officer stops by Dwight’s house to check out his car yet fails to even look in the garage after Dwight responds to his questions with answers any 12-year-old who ever watched a police show on TV would find suspicious. One scene that doesn’t seem plausible might be excusable, but more than one yanks the rug out from under the film.
Reservation Road was directed by Terry George and is rated R for language and some disturbing images.
GRADE: D+
