With his recent unfortunate death at age 27 in a vehicle accident, Anton Yelchin takes a spot in film history similar to Heath Ledger, where lots of people will celebrate his catalogue, but we’ll wonder what more he could’ve done if he hadn’t died before his time. “The Driftless Area” is among the final films of this actor who broke out as a kid in “Hearts in Atlantis” and found mainstream success as Chekov in the new “Star Trek” series. He also played Kyle Reese in “Terminator Salvation.”
With his mesmerizing hoarse voice, Yelchin plays Pierre, who falls into a well and is rescued the next morning by Stella (Zooey Deschanel). And when Pierre takes a bag of money from small-time thief Shane (John Hawkes) – who also is an arsonist who killed/kills/will kill Stella — they become targets of dangerous small-town Wisconsin criminals.
The indie-aesthetic film from director Zachary Sluser, adapting Tom Drury’s novel, itself feels “driftless” because of its roundabout, circular, inside-out, loop-the-loop plot structure. Pierre tells Stella about a book he read that espouses that time isn’t linear. He uses this example: Just as Sydney, Australia, currently exists even if we haven’t been there, the future exists now even if we haven’t experienced it yet.
And so “The Driftless Area” is told in an order that makes no linear sense. I don’t know if it works in the novel or not, but it’s a tough sell on film. At least “Memento” and that one “Seinfeld” episode were just flat-out backward, but this movie doesn’t achieve that level of internal logic. Sluser is trying to get us to imagine what a story would be like without a natural A-to-B-to-C progression, and I think there are supposed to be some spiritual and karmic overtones teased out by this structure. I tried to get into the vibe, but couldn’t quite do it, so from that standpoint, the film felt flat to me.
On the other hand, Yelchin is compelling as a leading man who loves life in an uncomplicated way; when melancholy friend Carrie (Alia Shawkat) asks why he thinks life is fun, Pierre says “because leaves move.” Deschanel is in a throwback role for her, the type of thing she did more often before entering the mainstream with “New Girl”: She looks pretty and sad, and serves as a love interest without the love story having to be bluntly spelled out. Deschanel has great chemistry with Yelchin, but she’d have great chemistry with anyone she wanted to, I suspect.
Veteran character actor Hawkes, who I know best from the outstanding “X-Files” episode “Milagro,” infuses some humanity into tired, veteran criminal Shane. Aubrey Plaza is also on hand, for some reason, as Jean, who works the rental-car desk that serves as a front for the crime organization. And Frank Langella is Tim, who is a Yoda figure to Stella as she deals with having been killed in the fire.
With the deliberate way some scenes are staged, there’s a bit of a weird comedy vibe to “The Driftless Area.” For example, Shane needs Jean to sit on his back, not as a bizarre sexual thing, but rather to straighten it out after a truck accident. On the other hand, there are plenty of visually beautiful scenes, from Pierre and a sunbathing Stella looking at the clouds, to an after-dark gunfight in a lush green forest. (If nothing else, the film looks nice. The Driftless Area is part of Wisconsin that wasn’t flattened by glaciers, so it instead features bluffs and caves. Not known for farming, it’s a good area for hunting and rock collecting.) Combined with the indie-movie music, it’s clear that we’re supposed to take these events seriously, not as a joke.
There are also elements I didn’t get the point of. For example, Tim has Stella lifting small weights as part of her training regimen. Maybe it’s a metaphor for finding the strength to seek vengeance and closure. Maybe the dumbbells mean nothing; the film has a dreamlike quality, and the theory goes that all dreams have one completely meaningless element.
For me, “The Driftless Area” is less than the sum of its parts, as I didn’t get into it enough to want to watch it again and figure out the point of it. At the same time, there’s enough good stuff here that I don’t resent watching it, and Yelchin fans will treasure one of his final performances.