I had this one at home from Netflix for almost a month before I was finally able to start watching it and then it took me almost a week to finish it. It's one of this year's nominees (Viggo Mortensen for Best Actor), and without the Oscars I probably would never have seen it. Ben Cash (Viggo Mortensen) has been raising his six kids off the grid. Like, way off. They have formed a happy little enclave in the middle of the Pacific Northwest forest and seem content to grow their own food, make their own clothes, and read everything from theoretical physics to The Joy of Sex. When Ben learns his hospitalized wife (Trin Miller) has committed suicide but that her parents refuse to have her cremated in accordance to her wishes, he makes plans to drive to Arizona to stop the funeral. For the first time, the children are exposed to real outsiders, making them and Ben question the methods by which they were raised.
This movie is a really fascinating glimpse into all the pitfalls associated with raising kids, especially by a single parent. The Cash children are in some ways models of the Renaissance and in others complete naifs. Ben's philosophy that American society is inherently corrupt and is destined to implode may sound like a crazy person's, but his kids are well-fed, disciplined, educated, and arguably better prepared to succeed. Their only real lack is of experience, and what parent doesn't want to protect their children from the horrors this world is capable of producing in greater and greater numbers?
All six of the child actors in this film were amazing. They really sold their performances and this movie lived and died by them, not the adults. At times, this movie was unbearably awkward and studiously quirky (think Wes Anderson's Moonrise Kingdom with a hard R rating). It's sharp, though. I think everybody should see it. Even if you don't like it. It deserves to be seen.
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