Overall Rating
  Awesome: 41.75%
Worth A Look: 55.34%
Average: 2.91%
Pretty Bad: 0%
Total Crap: 0%
9 reviews, 49 user ratings
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| Station Agent, The |
by Robert Flaxman
"It's a small wonder."
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Action is all well and good, but there’s definitely something to be said for a quietly comic film that’s merely about the ins and outs of human interaction, and The Station Agent is about as good a film as you’re likely to find in that category. With spare, intelligent writing and direction from first-timer Thomas McCarthy, the film is a restrained look at the way people come together.Finbar McBride (Peter Dinklage) is a dwarf living in Hoboken, working in a model train shop owned by his only friend, Henry (Paul Benjamin). One day Henry dies and leaves Fin a train station in rural Newfoundland, New Jersey. With few other alternatives, Fin moves into the station. Soon he meets a nearby hot dog vendor, Joe (Bobby Cannavale), and an artist, Olivia (Patricia Clarkson), coping with the death of her son and separation from her husband. The three form an unlikely friendship, while Fin also has encounters with Cleo (Raven Goodwin), a young girl who lives nearby, and Emily (Michelle Williams), who works at the town library.
Unsurprisingly, the film does not shy away from the subject of Fin’s height; it’s obvious that he’s learned to deal with people treating him as a curiosity, which probably explains why he had only one friend in Hoboken. The key to the friendships Fin makes in Newfoundland is that all of them treat him simply as another person – Cleo brings his height up at first out of curiosity, but doesn’t mention it again, and Joe mentions it once, but compared to the film’s peripheral characters, it’s as if the subject were never even broached. These are merely people becoming friends because they enjoy spending time together.
You’d think such a simple plot – and that plot alone does indeed take up most of the film and certainly is its central focus – would be too dry or become tiresome, but nothing could be further from the truth. Despite their ability to become friends, these characters don’t have much in common except for the fact that they don’t seem to have any other friends, and watching their personalities bounce off each other and start to mesh has a genuine appeal. The comedy in The Station Agent is undeniably subtle – there may not be a single “joke” in the entire film – but it is immaculately delivered. The character interaction is beautifully executed on every level.
Credit McCarthy’s script, but definitely credit the actors. Dinklage, Cannavale, and Clarkson are brilliant as the trio at the heart of the film – their scenes have a genuine intimacy, the sense that these people really just get along well. Feeling isolated from the rest of the world – when Olivia realizes a friend has come to visit, she pretends to be just leaving – the characters are able to find time for each other.
There are some places where The Station Agent could have benefited from a little less sedation. Fin has almost no reaction at all to Henry’s death, and when Olivia takes a near-fatal dose of pills, the film spends about a minute dealing with the matter and then brushes past. It’s not that these are things that had to be made the central focus of the movie, but they’re pretty crucial life moments that, within the confines of the plot, feel more perfunctory. They might as well be macguffins – while the characters move where the plot wants to take them because of these moments, the moments themselves don’t seem to mean anything. In a film that’s all about lonely characters, such moments should mean more than they seem to.These are but minor blemishes on the film, though. McCarthy has created an insular little world full of characters who, if left to their own devices, would probably find themselves alone; the town of Newfoundland serves as a meeting place for these disparate souls. Their lives are changed in whatever way by virtue of finding each other, and the way they find each other is a joy to watch.
link directly to this review at https://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=6913&reviewer=385
originally posted: 12/01/04 03:11:00
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This film is available for download or online viewing at CinemaNow.com For more in the CinemaNow.com series, click here.
OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2003 Vancouver Film Festival. For more in the 2003 Vancouver Film Festival series, click here.
OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2003 Sundance Film Festival. For more in the 2003 Sundance Film Festival series, click here.
OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2003 Starz Denver Film Festival. For more in the 2003 Starz Denver Film Festival series, click here.
OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2003 Chicago Film Festival. For more in the 2003 Chicago Film Festival series, click here.
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USA
03-Oct-2003 (R)
DVD: 15-Jun-2004
UK
N/A
Australia
05-Feb-2004
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