THE STRAIGHT STORY
1999

March 16, 2002
DVD
France/UK/USA
English

Richard Farnsworth. Sissy Spacek. Directed by David Lynch.

Absolutely delightful (and delightfully slow) story of an old man, without a drivers license, who must travel by riding mower to visit his estranged ailing brother 400 miles away.

Spacek plays the mentally challenged daughter, but it is Farnsworth’s film through and through. He travels down country highways, pulling a huge trailer behind his old John Deere. He camps at night and meets people in the small towns between Iowa and Wisconsin.

His body has a lot of miles on it, but his mind is still sharp and strangers are instantly trusting of him when he appears in their town. The pace is slow, the scenery magical. I’m glad I finally got a chance to see this one.

9.1 Critical Consensus