You know you are not watching just any old prestige drama when a film throws in a shot of its lead character - played by a 2-time Oscar winner - defecating a mere three minutes into its running time. Chloé Zhao’s Nomadland is a film concerned with the concrete realities of life. Things that might seem mundane or unmentionable but take up a big part of everyday life. How a woman carves a small place on earth to sleep, eat, work and yes defecate.
Fern (Frances McDormand), having lost her work and home when the factory that employed her in a now-defunct company town closed, refurbishes her old van and sets out in the vastness of the American West to find seasonal work. She rests when she can, deals with the elements and makes tentative attempts to find a community among the older itinerant people she meets. They exchange DIY tips for survival, share stories and sometimes companionship. But mostly Fern is stubbornly on her own. She is grieving her husband, town and job. Combating her constant grief by constantly moving...
Zhao, who wrote the script adapting Jessica Bruder’s acclaimed 2017 nonfiction book, gives us a year in Fern’s life. In vignettes of scenes we get to know Fern and her world. The script is as sparse as Fern is withholding, hinting at Zhao’s observational methods. With the exception of David Strathairn as a fellow traveller somewhat smitten with Fern, everyone we meet is played by a non-actor giving us a bit of their biography making the story and setting authentic. Fern meets someone, we get a bit about them and then we move on. To the next place, the next person, the next season of Fern’s life. There’s a lot of “nice to meet you” moments hinting at the loneliness of this life. While we may want to know more about one character or the other, Zhao stays true to the title of the film in her narrative.
Captivating are the occasions when Fern gets in touch with nature. Like when Zhao captures her serenely swimming nude. Or when she cuts a friend’s hair, the camera showing us a tactile friendship as her fingers linger on the hair. McDormand delivers a clear-eyed quiet performance infused with her trademark no-nonsense demeanor and flashes of humor as she highlights Fern’s stubbornness. This is a woman set in her ways and clinging to solitude like armor.
Less successful are the scenes trying to place Fern in relation to her family. Those feel forced and unearned, as if belonging to a different movie. One that is not mired in the credible community of nomads but rather a clumsy class comedy in which Fern makes earnest proclamations about the pitfalls of capitalism and the real estate market. It's as if these scenes are trying to explain why McDormand spends the rest of the film among non-actors and not about giving Fern more context.
Adding to the stirring atmosphere Zhao creates are the score by Ludovico Einaudi and cinematography by her frequent collaborator Joshua James Richards. Nomadland builds to an affecting experience as it reaches its climax. Never answering the question whether being a nomad is a choice for Fern or was she forced into it by economic necessity. Therein lies its strength, it has so convincingly shown this world that what seemed clear at the beginning - that she was forced into it - becomes murkier.
Nomadland is sold out at NYFF but is expected to open in December.
more from NYFF
more on Nomadland