[LMS] Half Nelson

Half Nelson, by Ryan Fleck (USA 2006)


I do not have many things to say about this movie, but I jot down two lines all the same because I am not watching many movies and I need to keep up my training in writing about cinema.
This movie tells about an american teacher whose life is slowly disgregating. He is a drug (I believe crack) user. Roughly speaking the reason why is life is losing its thread is that society around him is breaking up and offers many reasons for desperation (the story is set in one of the degraded areas of Brooklyn).

Our guy is a good teacher, able to capture the interest of his students; the twist in the plot comes when a student sees him while under the influence of drug - and the story becomes interesting because the trust that the girl had in him is not destroyed by this event. This choice of maintaining the trust does not seem too wrong from a practical point of view (he is willing to spend his own energies in her favour), but beyond the practical side of the situation there is a need and desire of companionship by both persons, that is fulfilled.

Among the things I liked there is a keen and, in my opinion, meaningful contrast between the work of the protagonist in the classroom, when he is lucid and effective, and the various moments of human relationship, when often people remain vague and communication does not work. The humour which is in the movie is not bad, as well. And, in the end, this is a movie whose themes and insight are open to understanding only to those who know something out of their direct experience about the situations that are dealt with: so what I wrote, I think, leaves out much of the meaning of this work.