“Get Low” opens with an image of a burning house and a man running away from it. The film, we are meant to presume, will tell us how the house started burning and who the man is.
It’s pretty easy to guess that the man is Felix Bush, played by a grizzled-looking Robert Duvall. Bush lives alone in a cabin in the woods, just him and his mule, and yes, both are stubborn asses. The whys and wherefores of the fire, rest assured, will come later.
Bush looks like your standard crazy hermit, with a beard as wild as the look in his eye. He’s got his shotgun permanently attached to one hand, and while automobiles are seemingly common, he’s still rolling his wagon. That is, when he actually does leave his property.
The subject of whispers and legend, Bush has decided it’s time to “get low” – that is, get down to business. He approaches a local preacher about wanting to arrange a live funeral – anyone who has a story to tell should come and tell it, while he’s still alive.
The preacher wants nothing to do with it, but Frank Quinn (Bill Murray), the town funeral director who is eager to make a quick buck, will gladly take on the task. Quinn’s assistant, Buddy Robinson (Lucas Black), finds himself along for the ride, whether he likes it or not.
To most of the people in town, Bush is a character, an animal even. The one person who really sees him as a person is Mattie (Sissy Spacek), a woman from long ago in his past ( “We had a go,” he says). They knew each other in another life, and a scene of the two of them, lit only by firelight, is lovely and has a sincerity not found in most love scenes on-screen today.
But, of course, the past is not simple. Bush’s lifestyle is the result of a painful time he can’t let go of (and yes, it has something to do with that burning house). He dreams about a woman in a white dress, a woman whose picture he keeps. He’s held on to a long-gone tragedy, buried it within himself.
“I built my own jail,” he tells the Rev. Charlie Johnson (Bill Cobbs), the only person who knows the truth.
Local connection”Get Low” is loosely based on the story of Felix “Bush” Breazeale, who threw himself a living funeral party in Roane County, in 1938. Dalton native Lori Beth Edgeman plays Black’s character’s wife.
The lesson that people come in shades of gray is not terribly novel. Director Aaron Schneider, helming his second feature, and writers Chris Provenzano, Scott Seeke and C. Gaby Mitchell, aren’t breaking any new ground
here. But if nothing else, it’s well put.”
“We like to imagine that good and bad, right and wrong, are miles apart,” the Rev. Johnson says, “but very often, they’re all tangled up with each other.”
Filmed in Georgia, “Get Low” is the kind of movie made for actors like Duvall and Murray. They’re just doing what they do. Spacek turns in a low-key, hearfelt performance as Mattie, and Black, who might still be best known as the kid from “American Gothic” (if not “Friday Night Lights”) does fine work as a young apprentice who doesn’t quite know what he’s getting himself into.
And yes, we do learn about the burning house, but you’ll have to go see the film to find out more. Ultimately, however, “Get Low” is about one thing: forgiveness.