Academy Award-nominated Ryan Gosling delivers a heart-wrenching performance of a teacher on the brink of total self-destruction.
At times, middle school history teacher Dan Dunne (Ryan Gosling) feels like he can’t go on anymore. Despite his edgy, rule-breaking persona that inspires his inner-city students, outside the drab Brooklyn classroom he struggles with dysfunctional relationships, an unfinished children’s book he’s trying to write, and a serious drug addiction that resisted rehabilitation.
A Man on the Brink
Although an intelligent young man with seemingly unlimited potential, Dan is “done” trying to live up to conventional standards and teeters on the brink of losing his job, his sanity, and his very life to substance abuse. One day after school when he thinks everyone has gone home, he foolishly smokes crack cocaine in the girl’s restroom. One of his students, Drey (Shareeka Epps), an impoverished black girl from a broken home, accidentally learns his secret, and they form a bond of sorts.
With his life falling apart around him, Dan finds himself in no position to act as advisor or mentor to the girl, yet their relationship goes beyond the traditional teacher-student relationship. Drey’s older brother awaits release from jail for a drug offense, which makes her especially sensitive to her teacher’s plight. Her brother’s drug-dealing friend (Anthony Mackie) plays a tug-of-war game with Dan over the role of Drey’s protector.
A Man Without Direction
In Half Nelson, Gosling masterfully portrays a directionless man who would probably not even get out of bed (or off the floor) each morning if his students didn’t rely on him for his expertise with dialectics. Attempting to meet some of their educational needs allows him to vicariously spoon thimblefuls of purpose into his bottomless pit of emotional needs. His casual romantic relationship with another teacher at the school sadly reflects his misplaced priorities and inability to be emotionally intimate.
The character of Drey appears quite advanced and mature for a middle schooler living in a drug-infested slum; in fact all the students in Dunne’s class seem marvelously – to the point of unbelievably – well-behaved (with the exception of one cheating student) and attentive for a bunch of hormone-crazed thirteen and fourteen year-olds. Epps delivers a fine performance that implies her character understands far more than she vocalizes.
Hand-held cameras, extreme close-ups, and out-of-focus scenes during some of Dan's less lucid moments put the viewer right there in the center of the action. The pace drags a little sometimes, and there’s really no action other than a little sex and lots of coke snorting. Without special effects or action, it’s essential that the story be compelling. Dan tells his students “History is the study of change over time. What is change? Two things that push against each other in opposite directions.” Like the amateur wrestling move after which the film was named, Dan stays locked in one position until he and Drey push against each other in opposite directions. The characters in Half Nelson find themselves in nearly hopeless situations, yet we can still hope for change.
- Half Nelson
- Director: Ryan Fleck
- Run time: 107 minutes
- Rating: R
- DVD Bonus Features: Rhymefest “Wanted” music video, filmmaker commentary, outtakes, deleted and extended scenes, English/Spanish subtitle options.
To learn more about dramatic films, read Powerful Acting in Reign Over Me and Things We Lost in the Fire.
