"Junebug" is a special movie. It's a perfect movie. It's one of the funniest, sweetest, saddest, most honest, most realistic films you'll ever see. If you enjoy independent cinema, you'll understand just how perfect and wonderful "Junebug" is as a film. If you live in the South, you know people like this. You'll immediately see just how perfect this film is.

I don't want to spoil too much about the story. The plot here concerns a very sophisticated and urbane young woman named Madeliene (Embeth Davidtz) who marries a man she meets very quickly. Madeliene is an art dealer in Chicago and when she travels to North Carolina to try and sign a deal with an eccentric folk artist, her new husband joins her as his family lives only a short distance away. The couple go to the house of his parent's so he may introduce them to his bride.

And so we have a culture clash, as Madeliene meets her new in-laws, a family made up of a quiet and demure father, a chain smoking, well-intentioned mother, a younger brother with a chip on his shoulder and, the best of all, a young, pregnant, hyperactive sister-in-law with a mouth that doesn't stop talking.

And here is the first true joy of "Junebug." Amy Adams as Ashley is so wonderful and delightful and cute and funny that it is impossible not to simply fall in love with her. Her juxtaposition against the city-bred Madeliene is simply wonderful. But what is great about this entire film, something that comes from the script by Angus MacLachlan, the direction Phil Morrison and all of the acting, is that this film isn't about stereotypes or humor based on over- exaggeration when it comes to the family. Madeliene is a refined and well-bred woman but she isn't Mrs. Drysdale and her in-laws are not The Clampetts. The beauty of the film is how real these people are. Madeliene has a sincere desire to meet her new family and fit in with them. She wants them to like her. She never judges them nor does she act superior to them in any overt way.

Likewise, the family may be Southerners living in a rural community but they aren't ignorant or "hillbillies." These are realistic portrayals of wonderfully written characters that portray a the situation evoked here not with overblown reactions and hyperbolic verbal outbursts (well, except for Adams who is so charming she makes every verbose line of dialogue seem as if it is coming straight of the top of her head) but with subtle nuances and reserved reactions as complex as calculus.

Another standout in the cast is the underrated Celia Weston who has continually made a place for herself in the cast of some of the finest examples of independent cinema in the past few years. Weston, as the mother, says as much with silence at times as Adams says with her verbosity. Kudos are also due Benjamin McKenzie, Alessandro Nivola, and Scott Wilson as the men in the family. Yes, this is a fine ensemble cast, perhaps the best of the year, and their work here makes "Junebug" nothing less than a joy.

The last act of the film dips into the sad and maudlin but even this shift into an expected turn we hope isn't really coming is handled perfectly by the cast. If your heart isn't into this film, even when it slows down at the end, then you need to take a good look at yourself. If you don't fall in love with these characters, then you must have the heart the size of a peanut.

Filmmaker Morrison provides a beautiful and lush ambiance for the film. Adept at hitting the mark during the comedic moments of the film, with pacing and timing that works to the microsecond, he is equally accomplished at brining us the quiet and tender moments of the film in ways that skillfully touch our hearts. One of the greatest devices in the film finds Morrison bringing us the empty spaces, the quiet moments in this rural Southern lifestyle and landscape. These images of empty rooms and the deserted shade under giant trees are presented with no sound evident. We see them as photographs, as artworks, much as Madeliene might. As the film progresses, as Madeliene evolves and acclimates, the sound eventually seeps into these moments. What at first seems "quaint" to her eventually becomes more than just that. It becomes a part of her.

As much about the things unsaid as said, "Junebug" shows us two of the ways in which people react to life. One might pull back, observe, consider what is there in the silence of their own mind. Another might try to cover the silences and the questions with a steady stream of dialogue and extemporaneous thought. Somewhere, in the center, between Madeliene and Ashley, between the silence and the sound, between the moments of joy and sorrow, between this second and that, lies the life we all live. "Junebug" is a film that perfectly exposes such moments. It is, simply put, one of the most wonderful films you will ever get to see.

Notes:

Filmed on location in North Carolina.

The film played Sundance and Cannes before beginning a limited arthouse run in the U.S. via Sony Pictures Classics in August of 2005.

Viewed at a sneak preview at the Dobie in the Art Deco Room in August of 2005.

Report Card

Script: A+

Acting: A+

Cinematography\Lighting: A+

Special Effects\Make Up: A+

Music: A+

Final Grade: A+