At Any Price
A family drama playing out against the landscape of Iowa,
this is a work that needed greater depth in the writing.
The American-born Iranian director Ramin Bahrani made his name with films that established his concern with social issues, features such as Man Push Cart and Goodbye Solo. Recently 99 Homes confirmed this tendency but suffered from falling into a melodramatic tone. Despite a late death and plenty of tensions, At Any Price, made in 2012 and thus preceding 99 Homes, is more even in tone but, despite Bahrani co-writing the screenplay, it seems a less personal work. Given a delayed release here and a limited one to boot, At Any Price is not a disaster, but it emerges as a pale echo of what it might have been.
Maika Monroe and Zac Efron get intimate
It is set
in the farmlands of Iowa where Henry Whipple (Dennis Quaid) not only
has his own
farm but runs a competitive business selling seed. The other central
figure is
his rebellious second son, Dean (Zac Efron), whose interest lies not in
the
farm but in speedway racing. Furthermore, times are changing and the
family’s
future is uncertain. Dean has an older brother marked out by Henry to
inherit
the farm but he, currently abroad in Argentina, fails to return when
expected
and seems to be defying any claims that Iowa and the family have on
him.
However, the most overt threat comes from the fact that Henry has been
defying
new laws by both selling on seed and using it on his own land twice
over. That
this could be found out worries Henry even more than the fact that his
wife (Kim
Dickens) has discovered that he is having an affair.
The length
of 104 minutes is not excessive, but there is a lack of tautness in the
telling
of this tale which also suffers from the two main characters, Henry and
Dean,
being allowed to emerge so unsympathetically. Henry’s way of presenting
himself
as an honest salesman sets an ironic tone that extends to the film’s
view of
American society as one that, contrary to the underlying reality, apes
the
manners of traditional respectability. But that’s not enough to sustain
the
film. Although deceitful, Henry is a man under pressure to maintain a
farm that
had belonged to his great-grandfather and his still living father
before him
(the latter critical of his son) and he feels let down by his children.
Similarly,
Dean is probably jealous of his older and more favoured brother while
also
aware of all the limitations inherent in living out his life in rural
Iowa.
This would all become dramatically meaningful if the writing had
insight of the
kind exhibited by Arthur Miller in his plays All
My Sons and Death of a
Salesman. Here, however there is no depth and the resolution
when it comes
seems glib and superficial.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Cast: Dennis
Quaid, Zac Efron, Kim
Dickens, Heather Graham, Clancy Brown, Maika Monroe, Chelcie Ross, Red
West.
Dir Ramin Bahrani, Pro Ramin Bahrani, Pamela Koffler, Justin Nappi, Teddy Schwarzman, Kevin Turen and Christine Vachon, Screenplay
Hallie Elizabeth Newton and Ramin Bahrani, Ph
Michael Simmonds, Pro Des Chad
Keith,
Ed Affonso Gonçalves, Music
Dickon Hinchliffe, Costumes Tere
Duncan and Sandy Lazar.
Big Indie Pictures/Black Bear Pictures/Cineric/Killer Films/Noruz Films/Treehouse Pictures-StudioCanal.
104 mins. USA/UK. 2012. Rel: 1 January 2016. Cert. 18.