North Country

Overall a decent movie that could have been a lot better in the hands of a better director. Luckily the directors inabilities with the story and how to show it did not destroy the movie completely which is mostly due to Charlize Theron. She definitely proved that Monster was not a fluke. All the acting was good. Even Woody Harrelson who I normally don't care that much for was on the mark.


Spoilers To Follow:


While most of the stuff at the mine was done pretty well it was all the in between stuff that wasn't handle very well all the time. The scene at the bar when we first meet Bill White (Woody Harrelson) was way to long. It could have been half as long or shorter and still served its purpose. The part when Sherry (Michelle Monaghan) hit on Bill was completely unneccessary and helped show another part of the problem with the movie. It was like Niki Caro didn't want you to feel to sorry for the woman. Like she wanted you to kind of feel like they invited some of it on themselves.

I liked the difference in how the woman saw stuff and were torn with what to do. Should they side with Josey or just keep quite. Especially Glory (Frances McDormand) being the union rep. She was trying to fix the small things perfectly content to try and be one of the boys maybe hoping the others would follow her lead and that would slowly start to make things better only none of them really knew how to do that. It was also interesting to see how she was still basically afraid or unwilling to help the cause when she had nothing else to lose fearing it might only make the problems worse.

Interesting the difference in the laws and courts today though. If they tried something like they did with that teacher and trying to make her out to be a slut for having sex with a teacher nowadays the judge would most likely fine them beyond all belief. That was so out of control. And that guy was the most despicable person ever for lying about what he saw.

I did like the scene at the union meeting when she tried to speak. I did really care for her father until that point. And I couldn't figure out why he was being such a jerk to her and that scene answered it. He didn't really believe her because he hadn't seen it until then. But when he actually saw how bad it was he realized he had been the jerk and his daughter wasn't lying. Not that, that totally made up for his behavior but at least he came around to her side a bit.

You know that this movie wouldn't have been made if Josie and the others hadn't won their case so I was wondering how they were going to give the end any dramatic impact. That was probably the only thing the director nailed. Having everyone slowly stand up and show their support for Josie, starting with Glory's boyfriend reading that letter for her was really powerful.


Paid full price and despite my issues with the directing it was still worth that price.