Uncle Frank

A road film set in America in 1973. Beth grew up in South Carolina. Her family is large, everyone talks at the table, and her father does not much care for her. Her uncle Frank lives in New York. He teaches literature at a university and comes home once a year. Beth goes to New York too. She enrols at the same university and calls at her uncle's flat. She learns something there. Frank has been living with Walid for more than ten years and nobody in the family knows. Then a telephone call comes. Frank's father has died and they must go south for the funeral. Frank wants to drive. Beth gets in and Walid follows them secretly. From there the film is a journey. A motel, a petrol station, a bottle, and a town drawing closer. Frank starts drinking on the road. The narrative opens his youth in flashback and what happened between him and his father comes out. What the narrative is interested in is not a secret but shame: at its centre is a man carrying for years what someone else said to him. The scene with the will is the turning point. The dead man leaves one sentence behind, and that sentence decides everything. Walid is the film's balance. He is calm, direct, and carries no shame; the opposite of Frank. The tone is soft. The narrative does not build its conflict hard and the resolution comes easily for many viewers. The production was made for a streaming platform. Paul Bettany, Sophia Lillis, Peter Macdissi and Margo Martindale are in the cast. Alan Ball wrote and directed. Who it is for: anyone who likes period drama and films built on family secrets. Who it is not for: anyone looking for a sharp narrative; the ending ties up too neatly and most of the supporting characters are types.