Worth: $18.50
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Cast:
Joel Edgerton, Sigourney Weaver, Quintessa Swindell, Esai Morales
Intro:
...gets it hooks right into you...
Though he has written and directed around all sorts of genres and all manner of themes (from the horror of Cat People and the Hollywood madness of The Canyons through to the dark sensuality of The Comfort Of Strangers and the eternal social struggle of Blue Collar), cinematic master Paul Schrader has always specialised in tales of “god’s lonely man”, namely isolated, emotionally disconnected men who battle in moral wastelands to do the right thing with little to no guidance, and often with tragic results. Schrader’s best films as a screenwriter (Taxi Driver, Rolling Thunder, The Last Temptation Of Christ) and writer/director (Hardcore, American Gigolo, Light Sleeper, Affliction, First Reformed, The Card Counter) all turn brilliantly on this theme, exploring its many layers in highly varied ways. As suggested by the title, the wonderfully idiosyncratic Master Gardener is Paul Schrader’s latest cinematic exploration of this oft-trodden but always fascinating territory.
Equal to his utterly staggering work in the brilliant Australian crime drama The Stranger, Joel Edgerton delivers nothing short of a masterclass on slow-burn intensity here as Narvel Roth, a quiet, reserved but obviously confident and wholly self-possessed gardener who happily tills the soil and works the fauna on the grand property of Norma Haverhill (Sigourney Weaver is superbly and suitably majestic, but with an edge of desperation), with whom he shares a decidedly unusual relationship. But when Norma advises Narvel that he must take on her troubled grand-niece Maya (excellently played by relative newcomer Quintessa Swindell) as an apprentice, their finely cultivated world begins to tangle and become increasingly complicated. We soon learn that though only young, Maya has a dark past…which is more than equalled by that of Narvel himself.
With beautifully composed images courtesy of regular cinematographer Alexander Dynan, and a gallery of engagingly unusual characters, Paul Schrader – still powering at the age of 77 – is at his uncompromising best here, taking his story onto intense and unexpected turf, while never losing sight of the essential optimism (slightly rare for the director) that lies at its core. Tough but poetic, Master Gardener is Schrader’s moving ode to man’s ability to change for the better, and to course correct for the good of those around him. Like all of the director’s best work, it’s a film that gets it hooks right into you, and then leaves them buried there long after the credits have rolled.
