Pity the hard-of-hearing eager gay moviegoers Gus Van Sant's age -- already in his 60s -- who think he made a Matt Damon John Krasinski movie about frotting. Matt definitely wants to drill, John is all Dude, no way are you sticking your equipment here, and while the bitter, bossy boys engage in increasingly tedious maneuverings to reach their happy ending, Frances McDormand steals the show. I don't mind Van Sant doing straight movies, but Promised Land is more Finding Forrester
than To Die For
. Based on a story by Dave Eggers, written by Matt and John, produced by Matt and John, and starring Matt and John, the film is full of one-dimensional rural Pennsylvania folk who exist to illustrate a single point, some of which yield nice performances. Fine. But the movie only gives lip service to complexity and it falls apart under the combined weight of a silly big reveal and one of the least convincing last-minute conversions in 21st century film.
Sure, fracking raises important issues, but why doesn't Van Sant go back to his queer roots? His last movie, the $8 million "indie" boy-girl drama Restless
starring Mia Wasikowska, had a domestic gross of $163,265. The same year Andrew Haigh's gay hook-up gem Weekend
(made for 120,000 pounds) grossed three times that in the US, $484,592, and over $1 million worldwide.
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