Big-Ups Movie: Half-Nelson

Jump to Comments

Just watched Half Nelson. Great movie.

To tell you the truth, the very premise of this movie involving a relationship between a teacher and his middle-school student struck me as a recipe for creepiness, but it turned out to be an utterly appropriate and highly believable one. I’ve gotta give the writers credit for being able to pull off the delicate balance without weirding anyone out.

The story begins with a young inner-city school history teacher and girls’ basketball coach named Dan Dunne, played by Ryan Gosling, who is a crack addict. He has almost nothing going for him — on top of his addiction, his love life is a mess and he’s being scolded by the principal for not following the prescribed school curriculum. The only things that keep him going appear to be his bright passion for teaching history to his kids (as he acknowledges) and his less laudable dependency on drugs.

One of his students and basketball girls, Dray (marvelously acted by Shareeka Epps), is a tomboyish thirteen-year-old who doesn’t seem to have too many friends her age and comes home to a single mom who loves her but is overworked and stressed about the household finances. Dray’s older brother Mike is locked up, but his old dealer crew is helping to support Dray and her mother in return for Mike’s cooperative silence.

One fateful evening after basketball, Dray encounters her coach in the bathroom, where he’s been taking hits, thinking the bathroom was empty. After a brief period of awkwardness, their friendship strengthens as Dunne frequently gives Dray rides home after basketball. There seems to be a mutual acceptance between them; he of her lonely teenage angst, she of his lonely dilemma as both role model and personal wreck.

Eventually both their troubles catch up with their friendship. Dunne loses his girlfriend and, upon colleagues’ suspicions of his hidden activity, his job. Meanwhile Dray is increasingly taken under the wing of her brother’s friend Frank, especially as she realizes that Dunne will never be more than her teacher and coach (at least twice the movie montages scenes of Dunne and Dray simultaneously doing different things — one montage has Dunne at a personal high, making love to his girlfriend while Dray, in a moment of identity crisis, tries on makeup and unravels her weave).

The plot comes to a head in one beautifully devastating scene when Dray, now fully involved as a runner with Frank, arrives at a motel room party to collect money and runs into her former teacher while he’s on a trip. Eye contact is made — Dunne even smiles faintly — but no words are spoken as he hands her the money. Later that night, a single tear runs down Dray’s cheek. This mirrors an earlier moment with Dunne tearing up while driving back from a get-together with his family; he has just lost his job, and his brother and girlfriend are very happy together. Both the teacher and student have hit new lows in their lonely lives.

The ending is cheerier and hopeful, which seems to be the obligatory high point on which to conclude the movie, but it doesn’t seem artificial, a commendable aspect of the film as a whole. Where the movie could have been gumdrop-sweet or achingly dramatic, the writers have opted instead for authentic dialogue and left it to the delivery of some very capable actors. The use of handheld cameras is another way the film breaks inner-city-teacher-movie conventions — this is no Dangerous Minds or Freedom Writers. It’s a drama that will slowly get you by the heart as you look at two characters entirely different by identity and circumstance, yet entirely similar in their need to be understood.

1 Comment

Filed under movie-films

Tags: half-nelson