Apathetic. Particularly in regard to politics, it is a word often used to describe today's twenty-somethings -- certainly most Hopkins students. This apathy is a subject of lamentation, and rightfully so, but how to alter the indifferent perspective of young Americans? Half Nelson, a film explicitly about change, seeks to produce it by awakening in viewers their dormant political consciousness. But the filmmakers are under no delusions: The burden placed upon he who has opened his eyes to injustice is heavy indeed.
The character upon whom that burden rests is Dan Dunn (Ryan Gosling), a history teacher at a New York City middle school who eschews the standard curriculum in favor of an education in dialectics and opposition to the powers that be -- heavy stuff at any age. In fact, he is also trying to write a children's book on the subject. Dunn, however, is not about to win any teacher of the year awards, and, if he did, would probably be the first ever to do so while addicted to crack.
Among the students in the class is Drey (Shareeka Epps, in a terrific full-length debut), a relatively quiet girl who is also on the basketball team that Dunn coaches. Her father is long gone and her brother Mike (Collins Pennie) is in prison for drug dealing, hence she lives with her overworked mother. She and Dunn establish an unlikely friendship after she discovers his addiction. Frank (Anthony Mackie) is Mike's former partner and attempts to be brother-in-absentia to Drey, a fact that irks Dunn.
Half Nelson is certainly not perfect -- countenance none who would suggest as much -- but it may well be the best film released in the U.S. thus far this year because it is so incisively intelligent and brilliantly acted. Gosling delivers a riveting performance, capturing Dunn's confusion and personal damage with nuance. Though Dunn is well-meaning, he is down and out and it's his fault. In many films that explore the drama of drug addiction, the motivations behind the initial use are unexplored. Half Nelson, too, does not do so overtly, but thanks in part to Gosling's fine acting, Dunn's reasons become apparent. He is seeking substance in what seems to be an increasingly shallow world, and not finding it. Dunn wants out of this vapid existence while still hoping that maybe he can convince his students to get it, to fight their subjugator, agitate for their freedom, and help the world become a better place.
Ryan Fleck, who directed and wrote along with Anna Boden, uses the film as a sort of manifesto, a plea for action. Peppered throughout the movie are clips of students in Dunn's class making presentations about such ignominious moments in American history as the Harvey Milk assassination and the U.S.-backed toppling of the Allende presidency in Chile.
The true genius of Half Nelson, however, emerges in the juxtaposition of the vigorous dissent of the past with the complacency of today. It is with unmitigated disdain that Dunn speaks of the high percentage of Americans who think there are WMD in Iraq, or subscribe to the fiction of Iraq-Al-Qaeda links. When his family speaks of an Iraq war protest they attended they are most enthused by the fact that Danny Glover was there.
Loathe, says Half Nelson, loathe the pop-politics of today wherein protest is less a matter of reasoned opposition than a chance to glimpse a celebrity. If only Dunn's lectures were more coherent. He has great passion, but his lessons will more likely leave the audience, for whom the class is a stand-in, flummoxed than inspired.
Half Nelson is not just a call to political arms --- it is a fine piece of filmmaking. The dialogue is notably natural, and effectively so. The scenes of drug use are few in number, but eloquent in their portrayal of the human tragedy of addiction. Perhaps most impressive is that Half Nelson turns a lousy paradigm on its head. In this case it is not the selfless, white social philanthropist who saves a struggling black youth from self-destruction, but quite the opposite. A worthwhile transformation from a movie that seeks to induce many more.
