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Evergreen

2004, Movie, PG-13, 86 mins

Evergreen: Review

EVERGREEN
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Writer-director Enid Zentelis' first feature revolves around a poverty-stricken teenager, Henri (Addie Land), living in the Pacific Northwest, whose first glimpse of how the other half lives kindles a desperate desire to distance herself from her impecunious roots. Henri's single mother, Kate (Cara Seymour), works hard, but she's an unskilled laborer and her minimum-wage salary isn't enough to make ends meet. When she can't pay the rent on their home, she and Henri are forced to move in with Kate's immigrant mother (Lynn Cohen), who lives in a dilapidated shack. The ceiling leaks and Henri and Kate sleep huddled together for warmth on the floor of the minuscule living room. Kate gets a job at a cosmetics factory while Henri struggles to fit in at the local high school and hide the fact that she and her mother are literally dirt-poor. She befriends wealthy classmate Chat Turly (Noah Fleiss), who invites her home; after meeting his parents, Susan and Frank (Mary Kay Place, Bruce Davison), she can't help but dream that she belongs in this seemingly perfect family. Kate, meanwhile, strikes up a relationship with Native American casino worker Jim (Gary Farmer), a loyal man whose efforts to treat Kate and Henri well fail to impress Henri — Jim, after all, is scarcely better off than they are. The perfect Turlys are, inevitably, less flawless than they seem; Susan is agoraphobic and Frank is constantly at the nearby casino and bar so he doesn't have to deal with his dysfunctional family. But Henri pretends she doesn't see the cracks in the facade and is soon practically living in their lush guest room, fabricating endless reasons why she can't go home. Chat grows disenchanted with Henri and Kate is distraught over her daughter's rejection; she simply can't understand why her child is so ashamed of her. To Zentelis' credit, she finds genuine tragedy in an unglamorous subject: the grinding, day-to-day efforts of working-class Americans to lead productive lives and raise their families while trapped in intractable poverty and barely able to keep a roof over their heads. Newcomer Land is well suited to the angst-filled role of Henri, but Place steals the show as a slightly off-kilter, Martha Stewart-worshipping homemaker. But while the film has striking moments, it feels padded with events that seem freighted with narrative weight but end up not mattering at all to the story. leave a comment --Angel Cohn
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