In 1994, 73-year-old Alvin Straight was told his estranged elder brother, Lyle, whom he'd not talked to for a decade, had had a stroke and was now on his deathbed. Being unable to obtain a driver's licence due to his failing eyesight and battling several other ailments of his own, Alvin resolved to catch a ride to his recently-bought, 30-year-old John Deere ride-on lawnmower and then travel 390km from Laurens, Iowa to Lyle's residence in Mount Zion, Wisconsin, to hopefully reconcile with him before he died. As the title suggests, the 1999 film The Straight Story covers Alvin's odyssey.
I was genuinely surprised how much I liked this, as director David Lynch's work usually alienates me with a vengeance; however, this discrepancy may be frankly because he didn't write this one. Lynch and writers John E. Roach and Mary Sweeney take what could've been a very dull or conventional true-life story and make it engaging by wisely applying a very picaresque approach. As Alvin travels across America, he encounters and gets to know numerous misfit characters, like a pregnant teenage runaway (Anastasia Webb) and a competitive cycling team, and I felt this served as much to maintain the viewer's interest as Alvin's socialisation. It's nonetheless a slow movie, but one that still demonstrates a clear narrative direction. Freddie Francis' relaxed cinematography enhances this.
But surely the heart and soul of it is Richard Farnsworth as Alvin, in an Oscar-nominated performance. He brings unmistakable dignity and quiet passion to the screen here, just like the real Alvin brought to his journey. I should stress I didn't quite love The Straight Story, but obviously I'd recommend it to other Lynch detractors and even people who've never seen any of his films. 8/10.
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