FALLING *

 Often terrifically well acted and very nicely directed and yet this tale of the fractious relationship between a middle-aged gay son and his elderly homophobic father never catches fire. Perhaps the fault lies with the screenplay which seems to search too hard for 'drama' or maybe it's the continuing jumping back and forth between the past and the present so our attention is never really focused. Long before we get to the half way mark we get the point and we soon tire of the father's bile and the son's self-sacrificing.

The writer and the director and the actor playing the middle-aged son are all Viggo Mortensen which makes you wonder how much, if any, of himself is invested in his character and if there is why don't we feel anything. Cliche climbs upon cliche, (during one argument the climatic scene of "Red River" is playing on the television), until it all becomes very tiresome. That said, Lance Henriksen is terrific as the father, Sverrir Gudnason is very good as his younger self and both Mortensen and Laura Linney, in much too small a role, are first-rate as the grown-up children. For Mortensen this may have been a labour of love but it's one that has backfired. Let's call it an interesting failure.