“The Weight” starts off quietly, with a wide shot on a picturesque country road. Birds are chirping, the dulcet tones of nature are humming, and all is peaceful. Until a car comes roaring down the road.
This is Samuel Murphy (Ethan Hawke). He might be driving like he’s a bootlegger on the run, but he’s really just a big softie trying to show his young daughter Penny (Avy Berry) a good time. “I told you,” he growls playfully at her from the driver’s seat as she smiles with delight. “I ain’t never been caught, and I ain’t never gonna be caught!”
This is a bit ironically prophetic coming from Murphy – who, in just mere moments, will be arrested and sentenced to hard labor, leaving Penny behind. But the opening of “The Weight,’ directed by Padraic McKinley with a screenplay from Matthew Booi and Shelby Gaines, is emblematic of the tone of the film as a whole – peace and quiet interrupted by quick action, and stillness permeated with the feeling that something very intense is about to happen. Much like Murphy, you’re always waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“The Weight” is a dependable, solid thriller that feels a little bit like a less cruel version of William Friedkin’s “Sorcerer” mixed with a little John Steinbeck. It’s straightforward and old-fashioned, and maybe a bit broad in its examination of the Depression-era United States and a man who just wants to get back to his daughter (don’t they all?). But, bolstered by a solid performance from Hawke, it executes on those tropes well, and makes for a thrilling ride along the way.
Murphy was arrested for punching a cop – he didn’t know he was a cop at the time, but he punched him, upset with the man for harassing him and Penny while they looked for a new rental after being kicked out of their old one. He’s put to work in a prison camp, and Penny is set to become a ward of the state long before the question of Murphy’s parole comes up. All hope seems lost, but Murphy’s determination and ingenuity eventually draws the attention of Warden Clancy (Russell Crowe). And Clancy has a proposition. Pick three good men to help you do a job for me, he says, and I can get you out early.
Murphy and his chosen comrades, Rankin (Austin Amelio), Singh (Avi Nash), and Olson (Lucas Lynggaad Tonnesen) are tasked with smuggling a whole bunch of gold before the newly elected President Franklin Delano Roosevelt can confiscate it via executive order. And so begins a dangerous, white-knuckled excursion through the Oregon wilderness, led by the quiet, raspy-voiced Murphy.
Murphy has a little bit of Hawke’s signature twinkle, particularly in his scenes with Penny. But there’s something a little darker about this guy than your quintessential Hawke character – he’s a little less chatty, a little more straightforward, a little more pragmatic in his views of the world. Right before Clancy offers him the job, he lets Murphy do a little pigeon shooting in his backyard. Murphy shoots the pigeons as soon as they leave their holding cage, and Clancy asks why he didn’t let them get a little farther for the sport of it all. Murphy doesn’t see it that way. You’re gonna kill the pigeons anyway. Why give them hope?
Murphy and his cohort are the pigeons, in this case, promised freedom at the end of their near impossible task, knowing there’s a far better chance that they end up dead. The political commentary in “The Weight” is about as subtle as that pigeon analogy, but not ill-conceived. In multiple scenes, Rankin and some of the other guys rail on Singh for being a socialist, upset with anyone who speaks ill of capitalism. Meanwhile, they’re risking their necks so a bunch of rich guys can keep their money, on the off chance that it might buy them a ticket out of prison. The thematic trajectory that the filmmakers want to elucidate is not a hard one to understand, but it meshes well with the film’s thriller sensibilities – it’s all about getting from point A to point B.
And those thriller moments represent “The Weight” at its best. Although “The Weight” never gets quite as intense, “Sorcerer” is an apt comparison, with the group facing down the fury and unpredictability of natural elements as well as human ones. Shot by Matteo Coco, the soft, blurred effect that permeates most of the film’s shots doesn’t do it many favors, but there are some stark visual moments characterized by contrast that help amp up the film’s tension, whether that be a terrifying strobing effect brought on by lightning, or the simple uncertainty of what lies in the darkness beyond. In its best moments, “The Weight” capitalizes on that uncertainty, feeling much like a clenched fist ready to swing, or a bottle rocket ready to explode.
