Thunder Road
Contrary to the movie-macho man often portrayed on screen, figures that other men can look up to and aspire to be, or the down-trodden man struggling to find his way or broken by the world, Thunder Road is about your regular Joe who’s just had enough. Not like Michael Douglas in Falling Down which tilted into parody. Here the multi-talented actor, writer, director, editor and composer Jim Cummings plays a cop going through a divorce, struggles to connect with his teenage daughter, and he’s just lost his mother. The lack of control he feels over his life is starting to weigh on him, and in Thunder Road we see that journey unfold.
The film opens with what is my favourite performance of the year, and which audiences and the press have been going on about since the film’s premiere in 2018. Our character stands up to speak at his mother’s funeral. A eulogy, you’d think. But this is the least cinematic eulogy you’ll ever see. The character struggles to string together a sentence, overwhelmed with thoughts and regrets. As soon as he starts to speak, another thought enters his mind, and he tries to vocalise that one, each time more teary eyed. This isn’t movie crying, graceful and full of depth. This is real, jaw clenching, undignified emotion. He tries to play Bruce Springsteen’s “Thunder Road” on a small CD player but can’t get it to play, adding to the frustration and tragedy of the moment, that with that small gesture he won’t get to say goodbye to his mother the way he had planned. So, to the audience of mourners, he starts to describe the song instead… It is a hypnotic, engrossing and exhausting 10 minute scene shot in a single take. And it sets the tone for what’s to come over the next 80 minutes.
It’s the perfect film for today’s modern times. Having just emerged from a financial crisis, we’re now set for another. Job insecurity, rising drug addiction, and rampant isolation are all feeding into a collective depression. Jim’s character embodies the loss of faith in the world that many of us must be feeling right now, set in the context of a man in his 30s trying to put things right.
The tone is unique and refreshing. You’ll often want to laugh, sometimes out of humour, sometimes out of awkwardness, in that David Brent/Michael Scott kind of way. Whilst you’re trapped with this poor guy, you’d be excused for feeling embarrassed at some of the self-pity, giggling at the clumsiness and desperation, and eventually rooting for him.
Though the emotions Jim allows himself to run with don’t help either him or those around, they are sincere and authentic. Possibly cathartic but definitely a cry for help. Maybe this is the kind of portrait of vulnerability we need right now, for the many who are struggling not just with the day to day, with their jobs, their marriages, their parents and their children, and also with living up to the perception of what a man is. This is some of the best fun I’ve had watching a film. A humanistic indie tragic-comedy that has a bittersweetness you won’t quickly forget.