Starring: Hal Holbrook, Ray McKinnon, Barry Corbin
Rated: PG-13 for brief strong language, some violence, sexual content, and thematic elements
An indie hit from 2009, That Evening Sun is a perfect caricature of east Tennessee and one of legendary actor Hal Holbrook’s finest performances. Based on a short story by William Gay, That Evening Sun follows Abner Meecham, an old famer who runs away from his old folks home to find his house being rented to the family of Lonzo Choat, a trashy-drunk. When Choat refuses to move out and Meecham refuses to return to the home, a battle of wills begins over the Tennessee farm. First time director Scott Teems (a professing Christian) gives the film a beautiful, literary pace. He also saturates the film with eastern Tennessee culture. Shot in Knoxville, the dialogue, accents, landscape, sets, props, costuming, and even cinematography all capture the culture so well, you can almost feel the Tennessee heat, hear the chatter of the insects, and smell the cheap beer on Choat’s breath.
The acting enforces this: Holbrook’s Meecham is a career performance, but Ray McKinnon’s Choat is also great. Perhaps it was the depth that Teems gives to the characters that allowed them to excel. Although on opposing sides, Meecham and Choat are similar characters, both are fighting others’ expectations, their own inadequacies, and the personal bitterness of their lives. In essence, their looking for redemption. And, without giving anything away, I can tell you this: That Evening Sun is simply that; a redemptive film.
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