Undertow

David Gordon Green’s small, unique body of work is characterized by a beautiful, fresh, off-kilter lyricism (like many other American film makers his age, he is an unabashed fan of 1970s cinema, good and bad), an eye for out-of-the-way places and people, and an abiding empathy with young misfits. This tall tale of a family in peril, reminiscent of children’s adventure stories, adds a rich, generous helping of Southern Gothic, with shades of Faulkner and Flannery O’Connor. A widowed Georgia farmer (Dermot Mulroney) is visited by his grinning jailbird brother (Josh Lucas), who is looking to settle an old score. In no time at all, the uncle has turned into the bogeyman for the farmer’s two troubled young sons, and Green’s film shifts into high gear. The boys’ breathless escape through forests, backwoods villages, small cities and shantytowns is reminiscent, both emotionally and visually, of Laughton’s The Night of the Hunter. Undertow’s greatest revelation is the strikingly physical, sharply intuitive lead performance by Jamie Bell (last seen dancing the title role of Billy Elliot) as the older brother who fights hard to keep from drowning in lethal currents of family misery. (KJ)