The loss of your soul is a terrible thing.
Swift shot: William H. Macy’s directorial debut, Rudderless is a film with substance and depth of heart. Rudderless reminds us that we are all human, and we all require compassion from time to time. As people push you away, that is when they often need you the most.
Sam (Billy Crudup) is a man without much to live for, and in fact, he’s not interested in much living following the unexpected death of his son, Josh (Miles Heizer). As the title suggests, he essentially checks out of the responsible world and decides to live off of his sailboat at a small lake community in Oklahoma. He works as a house painter by day, and at night he drinks until he passes out. Then, something happens that changes his life forever . . . again.
His ex-wife, Emily (Felicity Huffman) tracks him down and delivers their son’s belongings, but Sam is comfortable living in denial. He wants no part of reality. All parents will tell you, they want their children to bury them, not the other way around. And Sam’s grief spiral takes two years before he is confronted with his son’s baggage, literally. He decides to reluctantly go through the boxes and discovers his son’s music. Suddenly, reality has a new tune, but, he doesn’t want to share the songs with anyone else.
Enter into Sam’s life the enthusiastic pest in his alcohol addled existence, Quentin (Antnon Yelchin) who happens to hang out at the same local dive bar, managed by Trill (William H. Macy). Quentin is captivated one night when Sam finally works up the nerve to share one of his songs. Quentin becomes obsessed with Sam, with his music, actually and begins to actively badger him into letting them play some of his songs together. As time goes on, Sam develops a real friendship with Quentin. Sam begins an almost father-like relationship with the young talent. Helping Quentin deal with stage-fright and an odd phobia of the fairer sex, Sam enjoys his new reality.
Sam never lets anyone know about his past, he keeps it buried. Writers Casey Twenter, Jeff Robison, and Macy himself manage to produce a wonderfully compelling drama with an incredible soundtrack. Music helps, again literally, set the stage for the overall tone of the film.
With a nice supporting cameo by Laurence Fishburne as owner of the local guitar shop, Del, and a very small, yet significant part of Kate by Selena Gomez, Rudderless finds humor in tragedy, a melody that you can feel resonate with acoustic brilliance. It stays under your skin awhile, and like a loud concert will keep ringing in your ears as you ponder what it truly means to grieve.
Simon Steadman, Charlton Pettus and Fink composed the film’s original songs, and provide the perfect pitch in every scene. This one is, pardon the Crudup pun, a sweet sleeper that won’t bore you. It may even challenge you a bit.
