Long before he was turning heads and receiving Oscar nominations for dismantling bombs in Iraq (The Hurt Locker) or playing Ben Affleck’s trigger-happy sidekick (The Town), Jeremy Renner was honing his craft with character roles alongside some of Hollywood’s most elite. Among these include roles with Charlize Theron (North Country), Brad Pitt (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford), and Forest Whitaker in 2005’s A Little Trip to Heaven.
Whitaker plays Holt, a soft-spoken and clumsy insurance investigator sent to Fred and Isold’s small rural town to appraise a policy claim. This occurs after a car crashes into a bridge and leaves a charred, unidentifiable body (though the driver’s license and the car suggest that the body is of Isold’s brother, an on-the-run con man). If it is indeed her brother, Isold is the sole beneficiary of a $1,000,000 insurance policy. Whitaker’s Minnesota Fargoesque accent is enduring at times while annoying at others. Regardless of his accent, he plays his character perfectly. He has a certain quirkiness about him that can be difficult for a character to establish in a 90-minute time frame that a typical movie allows (especially when he shares screen time reasonably equally with Renner and Stiles). For example, he stutters when he is trying to lie. He has a shady job where his main goal is to save his company money, yet he can still show empathy. He lies, cheats, and breaks into houses to get to the most profound truth he can find. Because of his job, he can see honest claim holders, convinced that they are entitled to their share of the cash when they are beneficiaries, scratching and clawing when the money they consider theirs slipping away. Yet deep down inside, he still believes there can be innate goodness in all people. This is especially evident during his interactions with Thor. One scene in particular is when Holt looks into the matter at the family home, where he breaks from his role as investigator and lies down in the snow to make a snow angel with Thor.
Stiles holds her own as well. She is a down-and-out woman, living with a son she adores and a husband she cannot stand. She doesn’t see much hope in her future, and if not for her son, she likely could be completely hopeless. Her interactions with Fred are brief yet eventful. The tension between the couple is wire-tight. I sat uncomfortably in my chair throughout the movie, anxiously wondering when Fred would strike next and how he would do it. It is not a happy household. Stiles and Renner are spectacular as the unhappy couple.
The movie is shot in the desolate, dead-of-winter Minnesota landscape. There are many shots of beat-up old shacks, rundown cars, and snow whipping through the air, not from a current snowstorm but because of the wind. It is not a happy place to be. The characters mirror their environment. Holt’s presence in a local diner is a novelty because he isn’t one of the same faces seen over and over and over by the townspeople, many of whom have lived there for their entire lives. By the end of A Little Trip To Heaven, you realize this quaint little town is not only not heaven, but it might be the most miserable place to live in all of America.
Plot 7.5/10
Character Development 9.5/10
Character Chemistry 10/10
Acting 9.5/10
Screenplay 8/10
Directing 8.5/10
Cinematography 8.5/10 (this would be a 9.5 had a few of the night-time scenes not been so dark that it made it difficult to identify what was happening)
Sound 7/10
Hook and Reel 8/10
Universal Relevance 8.5/10
85%
I’d recommend A Little Trip To Heaven for the acting. Jeremy Renner fans will like the movie simply for his performance. Forest Whitaker fans will appreciate it for the same reason, though I’m not as sold on this as I am of Renner. If you go in with low expectations and look to appreciate the film for its setting and its acting, you will probably like it. You might even get into the story some, too, but even if you don’t, you will enjoy seeing three of today’s Hollywood stars in top form.