Emotions in the Garden...

Fireflies in the Garden…the name itself sets the tone & the feel of the movie. Hence I went to watch the film, expecting it to be on the lines of The Reader or Milk or Closure and it didn’t disappoint me at all. I was really excited about the film as it had my sweetheart Julia Roberts in it. The last film that I saw of hers on big screen was Ocean’s 11 as I watched Mona Lisa Smile, Ocean’s 12 & Charlie Wilson’s War on HBO. Though I knew she wouldn’t have much screen space as the film was all about Ryan Reynolds but one thing I guaranteed about was Julia’s role & performance! She has never ever let me down & I’m certain she never would.

Film sensitively deals with family values & its importance in everyone’s life. The tagline of the film is the crux of it. It says “sometimes family has to fall apart to come together” & the entire film was about it.

In his feature writing/directing debut, award-winning filmmaker Dennis Lee guides a stellar ensemble in this haunting family drama of recrimination and reconciliation in Fireflies in the Garden. Oscar-winner Julia Roberts is at the center of the story playing a beleaguered family matriarch who has subordinated her needs and desires to those of her family, particularly her cold, demanding husband (Oscar-nominee Willem Dafoe). Roberts’ sudden death brings her entire clan together and triggers a series of flashbacks that reveal how the today’s seeds of discontent were planted years earlier.

The opening scene sets the whole atmosphere of the film & establishes the characters resolutely. The scene has Julia Roberts, Williem Dafoe and Cayden Boyd as kid Ryan. The trio is coming back from some gathering and its raining cats & dogs. With in few minutes, director, Denis Lee, establishes a completely sour & strained relationship between the father & the son and consequently it has disturbed the equation between the father & the mother too. Julia is a protective, doting mother who always tries to shield the son from the father who can abandon the 10-12 year old in the middle of the road when its raining profoundly & zooms off with the mother sitting inside the car, helplessly trying to stop him. And the son is a rebel already at the age of 10 or 12. He dislikes his father, may be hates him, we don’t know yet. He loves the mother & sympathies with her helplessness. The 10-min-first-scene just drags you to their world. Visually the film was one of the most appealing pieces in recent past, thanks to Daniel Moder (Spider Man 3, Monalisa Smile & Déjà Vu etc.) for the unblemished cinematography.

The non-linear narrative makes it lyrically rich & convoluted. Its not one of those popcorn cinema where you can enjoy your popcorn & do everything except watching the film! It challenges your sensibilities in the sense that you’ve to concentrate to comprehend. I got involved in the film hotfooted. The characters were so meticulously crafted that you feel like you know them since many years! For instance the character of Julia’s sister, played by Emily Watson, is one of the most engaging & refreshing characters that I’ve seen in many years. She is cheeky, rude yet warm, blunt, brutally honest & has a sexual undercurrent with her nephew. Of course the film is meant to appease the family audience but it also tackles the situations today’s youth would connect immediately with.

The only stereotype character I found was that of Julia’s husband, played by Willem Dafoe. He is garish, loves to hate people, ruthless & merciless like many other evil fathers we’ve come across over the years in our own Bollywood & Hollywood as well. His scene with his son at the garage is one of the prominent & most imperative scenes of the film.

Ryan’s character as an introvert, almost stone hearted & someone who has nursed the grudges against his father since his troubled childhood was refreshing & challenging to play. He still has a child in him & it was established very subtly & warmly. His relationship with his nephew & niece was cute & intense and eventually he becomes extremely influential in their lives. Ryan is getting divorced with his wife & the family doesn’t know about it. Carrie Ann Moss, who played Ryan's wife, had ABSOLUTELY nothing to do in the film except having sex with her estranged husband on the day of memorial service of his mother. The mother (Julia Roberts) dies in an accident while going to the airport to pick her son (Ryan) up as he was returning to the town after many years.

Shannon Lucio, who played Ryan’s sister, did justice to her character completely and had never come out of her character. Ioan Gruffudd (Mr. Fantastic from Fantastic Four) played Julia’s lover out of her marriage had nothing much to do & was passable. The confrontation scene of him & Ryan in a restaurant is worth & deserves a mention.

Ryan’s association with his aunt is more of a friend than a mother figure & had sexual undertones throughout the film. And his relationship with his mother was never vocal & expressive but both used to communicate through emotions.

It’s a lyrical flow of relations with lots of clichés & sluggish moments but the film draws you in because of its emotions & warmth. The semi-autobiographical story centers on the complexities of love and commitment in a family torn apart when faced by an unexpected tragedy.

Fireflies in the Garden juxtapositions the past and present in a fluid, lyrical,and emotionally resonant manner to show us that, while family is hard to live with, it is impossible to live without...