By Brian Griffin,
★★☆☆☆
Prior to seeing Stillwater, I actually hadn’t heard much about it, and after a few weeks catching comedy action movies, this crime/drama/thriller really seemed to fall flat.
Stillwater centers around a very American father named Bill (played by Matt Damon), who travels from Oklahoma to France to help his estranged daughter (played by Abigail Breslin), who is in prison for a murder she claims she didn’t commit. The movie is spent with Bill’s character searching for evidence to help his daughter try and achieve freedom.
In a movie mostly focused on his character, it was important to cast a strong actor in the title spot of Bill, with Matt Damon carrying out his duties very well. His supporting cast consisted of Little Miss Sunshine’s Abigail Breslin who plays Bill’s daughter Allison. In the corner of the non-Americans, we have Camille Cottin as Virginie, a French aspiring actress who helps Bill with the case, mostly by being his French translator. Lastly, 9-year-old Lilou Siauvard played Maya, Virginie’s daughter.
In the director’s chair is Oscar-winner Tom McCarthy, who, apart from sounding like he plays minor hurling, won an Oscar for Best Writer for Spotlight (2015). He was also one of the writers behind Up (2009). Tom did a good job considering the trickiness of working with a true story, especially as you have to do justice to the story as well as making an entertaining experience. McCarthy was also a part of the writing team along with Marcus Hinchey and Thomas Bidegain(The Sisters Brothers).
If I’m going to be honest, the best part of the movie was clearly Matt Damon as Bill. Damon is obviously a pro, so it never feels like he is acting, which is great because we spend most of the 139 minute run time with him. Damon shines in his interactions with his cast, especially Lilou Siavard as Maya, and the pair really seem to have a natural chemistry that adds a very wholesome twist to the story. But while it is nice to see Damon learn the French for tools from Siavard, it does make you forget that the reason we are here is to watch Damon try and get his daughter out of prison. This creates a scale with his daughter in prison on one side and his new life on the other, when one advances the other suffers.
Another aspect I was a fan of was that that the majority of the movie was set in Marseille. Now, this is obviously because the real-life events took place in Marseille, but it’s nice to see what French life is like in a city other than Paris. The movie really dives into the Marseille aspect, creating a realistic world around the story. We even got treated to an experience at a Marseille soccer match, featuring a real-life game with their real players. They also didn’t lean too much into French stereotypes, with a pain au chocolat being the only appearance of French pastry. That’s obviously justified as they are class and inspired me to get some after seeing the movie.
On the other hand, I thought the portrayal of an American that visits another country was very accurate. Bill wasn’t all shotguns and hamburgers, well like he obviously has guns let's not get carried away, but his sheer lack of understanding of the culture at the beginning was done well, but to be fair he did embrace his inner Frenchman. I liked that.
Really the big issue I had with the movie was its length. It has a run time of 2h 20mins and you feel it. An argument could be made that there was deviation from the main story but I understand how this was important as it was again a true story. However, in a story where you are waiting for a single final decision to be made there was a lot of fodder.
Overall it wasn’t a terrible movie with some great performances especially from Damon and Cottin but the biggest problem Stillwater had was that it had to reflect real-life without having any bad guys because these are real people. I can imagine that people that have a strong affinity for documentaries on real-life crime would enjoy this more than me, but personally, I feel that there was nothing that made this movie any more than a possible vessel for Damon to get an Oscar.
Stillwater is in cinemas now
