ACTOR VARIES PERSONA JUST A BIT

WORKNG CLASS FATHER WALKS FOR TOLERANCE

By PETER THOMAS BUSCH

Joe Bell began a walk for change across America to raise awareness about childhood bullying.

Mark Wahlberg plays the small town working class father on this journey of redemption after his son comes out as gay in high school in Joe Bell (2021).

Director Reinaldo Marcus Green intertwines one narrative of the father’s journey in the present, with a second narrative from an earlier time when the son, Jaden, struggles emotionally. The second narrative provides the back story in a way that does not rely on psychodrama flashbacks.

Green adds a bit more aesthetics than in his other film currently in theaters, King Richard (2021) about Richard Williams, the father of two of the greatest professional tennis players, Venus and Serena Williams.

The director’s camera frames scenes and creates depth to the screen. And in this way, Green creates a variety of scenes different from those of the main journey of Joe walking down the Oregon highway through Idaho toward New York City. The camera stops for scenes under highway overpasses and inside restaurants and highway motels. Bell also stops along the way to give short speeches to organized gatherings about the purpose of his walking.

Wahlberg does a good job depicting Joe as accepting of his son’s sexuality, but at the same time being honest about the difficulties that come along with being different in high school. 

Like he did rising out of his poor Boston surroundings, Wahlberg worked tirelessly to gain recognition for his acting art amongst Hollywood’s A-List of actors.

Wahlberg’s screen persona has been cast in supporting and leading roles with such marque names as George Clooney and Diane Lane in The Perfect Storm (2000), and Helena Bonham Carter and Tim Roth in The Planet of the Apes (2001). But when director Martin Scorsese cast Wahlberg in an ensemble cast of A-Listers for a film about the South Boston Irish crime gangs in The Departed (2006), the acting credits became much more bonafide.

For The Fighter (2010) Wahlberg costars with Christian Bale in the true story about two brothers from a family of professional boxers, with Amy Adams in a supporting role as the love interest. 

Wahlberg develops a penchant for biopic roles, next playing the lead electrical engineer in an offshore drilling rig disaster in Deepwater Horizon (2016). And in All the Money in the World (2017) Wahlberg’s professional muscle character is hired by J. Paul Getty, played by Christopher Plumber, to find his grandson after his grandson has been kidnapped for ransom. Michelle Williams costars as Gail Harris, the daughter-in-law of J. Paul Getty.

The character actor can play on a spectrum within a tight band, but he is also cast in a variety of roles in different film genres, from apocalyptic dystopias to action heroes and biopic roles.

This acting range allows for the biopic character Joe Bell to make room on screen for his son, Jaden, while still carrying the lead and moving the narrative forward. Wahlberg shows how he can work beside leading actors such as Charlize Theron and Donald Sutherland in the Italian Job (2003), but the character actor also does not overpower supporting actors such as Connie Briton who plays Bell’s wife, Lola Lathrop.

Reid Miller plays Bell’s gay son, Jaden. Miller depicts Jaden as having more difficulty with how other people bully him than with coming out gay as a teenager. Jaden and his father have a strong bond before and after coming out, but the added pressures from his peers in high school prove too much for him.

Briton shows how the loving mother is stuck in the middle, and tries to keep the family together as best she can, unconditionally accepting them despite the obvious mistakes made along the way.

The shortness of the 94 minute runtime shows in the lack of story and character development, although there is value in an uncomplicated straightforward treatment of teen bullying and LGBQT rights.

Green jumps into the storyline a bit too quickly, and gives the bullying too delicate a touch, thereby limiting the audience’s experience in really feeling and understanding the sense of despair and helplessness that people get from the bullying.

But in this way, Green enhances the simple message of encouraging early intervention before the teen develops serious mental health issues from the social stigmatization.

The true story is made slightly more complicated by using inner personal struggles of the father and the son as a narrative device, closely spinning the father’s internal turmoil with the son’s inner trauma.

The director puts a score overhead to compel scenes forward, while using background noises, such as meat sizzling on a café kitchen grill and highway traffic on the roadside to make complete scenes full of action.

But in the end, the script and the narrative are not complicated enough for a wider audience.

Bell has few words but a big heart which carry the film for a while. Wahlberg paints Bell as a bit of an underdog as he gradually builds public recognition for his walk across America. The audience hangs around waiting for Bell to improve and become an accomplished advocate for his son.

Green’s creative camera work with angles and close ups begins in La Grande, Oregon and follows Bell’s walk to Twin Falls, Idaho with a wide angle showing the picturesque mountains as well as Bell walking on the highway. 

That same wide angle lens is then used to create poignant moments of a well bonded father and son in the same shot.

Cinematography Jacques Jouffret shows sheets of falling snow and the color of the sun over the snow peaked mountains to create depth in the scenes.

The entire film and all the director’s tricks have this same endearing simplicity. Like Joe Bell says, “the truth is all I have.” And Green maintains the integrity of that message by creating the simple truth of an unforgiving reality.

Joe Bell is streaming as the 99 cent movie of the week on Apple TV.