It’s curious and a bit droll that many films depicting individuals in the confines of witness protection occur toward these films’ end. The idea is toyed with in Sydney Pollack’s fictitious “The Firm,” as in the biographical and award-winning “Goodfellas.” However, in the 2005 crime thriller “A History of Violence,” directed by David Cronenberg, in his protagonist we’re confronted with a man named Tom Stall, who’s turned to hiding in a small town to avoid a mob-tied past he’d like to forget. While the violence is sparse, the film earns a hard ‘R,’ and shows the grip of violence on a man who mistakenly thinks leaving his past behind is as carefree as simply changing a name.
Viggo Mortensen, known more aptly for “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy or his turn as a inconsequential lover of a married rich women in “The Perfect Murder,” turns it up a notch as Tom Stall, running a small-town diner; and, we later learn, hiding from the mob. However a chance, late-night robbery at the diner – with Tom heroically saving the day – alerts some of his late “partners” that Stall, known to them as ‘Joey,’ may not be as once dead as they initially thought.
“A History of Violence” is a solid film, a practitioner of showing and not telling, and a picture that will make you love and hate its protagonist in equal measure. It starts slowly, but makes its points forcefully and powerfully. The film begins not with Tom’s café, nor dark, shady milieus where mobsters conjugate, but with a parked car idling outside a motel lobby in broad daylight. Two robbers have done a deed – in fact killed the entire staff in a very gruesome fashion. But it’s not what they did, but how Cronenberg and cinematographer Peter Suschitzky depict it – with uncomfortable, lingering cameras and deadpan acting from the perpetrators – that sells the violence to us. It’s foreshadowing to the fullest degree, letting us know what manner of violence we, the audience, should expect as the film progresses.
What works about the film is the violence that “Tom” is all but guilty of, and the kicking and screaming way he professes to be anything but for as long as humanly possibly. This is a testament to Morgensen’s acting, with “Violence” proffering more emoting than many of his other films have required. He’s of course backed up by solid talent. He has a wife, Maria Bello (“Coyote Ugly”), Ashton Holmes, who plays his son, and Heidi Hayes who plays his daughter. Their disbelief runs akin to Stall’s as his past becomes more and more inescapable: Especially when a shadowed and badly scarred man named Fogerty, played indelibly by the immensely talented Ed Harris, shows up looking for ‘Joey.’
The arc of the film is solid, and Cronenberg’s greatest achievement here is to keep Stall’s secret for as long as possible – until it is impossible to do so no longer. We, like his family, believe Stall. Especially in what amounts to the greatest shot in the film as we see Stall – wearing a cast – attempting to run from his restaurant to aid his family as a sleek, black car leaves town and heads towards his house, his hobbling and struggle as fruitless as his protestations of innocence. Of course, a deed that happens at the house threatens to shatter this image completely – but in the spirit of a spoiler-free review, that deed will not even be hinted at here.
At the heart of the film, aside its stark observations of how violent paths have a way of catching up with you, is a detective story that keeps audiences guessing with the same degree of disbelief as Stall’s family. This is juxtaposed with some innocent posturing, such as when Stall’s wife dresses up as a high school cheerleader to spice up their sex life, unaware of who her husband really is and what danger is looming just around the corner. We see effective foreshadowing here once again, however, when we glean Bello’s reaction when Stall’s past finally catches up to him. Is violence dangerous? Or sexy? Cronenberg doesn’t answer the question, leaving it up to audiences to decide.
The acting is good all around. And, in expert filmmaking, Cronenberg and company show how lost innocence may be more than a coincidence here, but a family heirloom. But to say more is to give away too much. Of course Stall must confront what made him run in the first place…but even as a quick look at the film’s cast list on IMDb threatens to give away who Stall is running from, I will not give it away here. It’s part of a mystery worth discovering.
This is a good film; not perfect, but worth the effort for the sadistic guessing game it makes you play, the graphic, in-your-face violence it portrays, and, on its underbelly, a fast-paced and unapologetic actioner that delivers. An entertaining film and a solid entry into this year’s Mob Movie March.
