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Drama of down-home discovery subtle as a 'Junebug'

By TERRY MORRIS
Dayton Daily News

Madeleine (Embeth Davidtz) is a sleek, sophisticated, British-born gallery owner in Chicago who specializes in "outsider" art. She's located an eccentric, but definitely unique "discovery" in the hills of North Carolina.

It just so happens that her handsome and somewhat younger new husband George (Alessandro Nivola) grew up in the same region and hasn't been back for a while. Why not combine some first-person wooing of the painter, who's crazy, with a visit to George's family?

Sony Pictures Classics 'Junebug' B Director: Phil Morrison Starring: Amy Adams, Embeth Davidtz, Benjamin McKenzie, Alessandro Nivola, Frank Hoyt Taylor Run time: 102 minutes Release date: August 5, 2005 Rating: R for sexual content and language. See showtimes On the web Official movie site View the trailer    Trailers require Quicktime [an error occurred while processing this directive]

Nothing could be simpler, but nothing is really simple in Junebug. That's the point, but also something that director Phil Morrison leaves open to considerable interpretation.

And what of simple folk? That's a term many, including Madeleine, might apply not only to a self-taught rustic madman artist whose value will be claimed by the first dealer who "discovers" what he's been doing obsessively for decades, but also to George's tight-lipped father, Eugene (Scott Wilson), disapproving mother (Celia Weston), ticked-off, resentful and uneducated younger brother Johnny (Benjamin McKenzie) and Johnny's sweet, spontaneous and completely honest wife, Ashley (Amy Adams), who's many months pregnant and is the heart of the film.

She's wowed by Madeleine, who's definitely an outsider in a house where it quickly becomes apparent that George has more in common with his clan and this land than she would ever have guessed because he's been such a smooth urban partner for her. She begins to see him — not unpleasantly — in a whole new light as he leads a hymn in the church basement, interacts with (but usually withdraws from) others in his family and also leaves her to her own devices until bedtime.

Madeleine's prized artist turns out to be a not very nice man, but the real epiphany is George's. He turns out to be the one at Ashley's hospital bedside as she faces complications.

Junebug, which is one of the baby names she considered for a child due in June, won't clobber you over the head with significance. It won't dazzle you with scenery, filmmaking technique or potent acting. It could get you to thinking about how there are always little things right in front of you that you haven't noticed yet.