Ulee's Gold (1997)

Best movie of this year hands down!

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Henry Fonda is one of the best actors in all of cinema. His son Peter has done some great films too, with one of his lesser known flicks (this) containing his best performance. Fonda was nominated for an Academy Award and almost won. While Fonda is the crown-jewel in this, the supporting cast is just as good and almost everything the movie has is A-1.Ulee's Gold is a character study about a reserved beekeeper named Ulee Jackson (Fonda) who takes care of his two granddaughters. 7th Heaven's Jessica Biel plays rebellious punk teenager Casey and her little sister is the more normal Penny. Their mother Helen is a junkie who abandoned them and their father, Jimmy (Ulee's son), is a convict in prison. When Ulee urgently visits his son, he gets informed that his son's criminal accomplices, Eddie and Ferris, have found Helen and have been caring for her in Orlando. When Ulee goes to get her, they say that for her exchange that they want the money Jimmy hid after a job that they never got. Ulee takes Helen home and must deal with her withdrawal symptoms after years of heavy rohypnol use. I personally thought Helen gave the best performance of an actress that year in a supporting role. Peter Fonda's calm performance is not one that could be taken lightly. We see the pain, heartbreak and struggles as he tries to bring his torn up family back together. There's some scenes where we see him dealing with the bees--he expertly handles the bees, and it reflects on how he will be handling his family. His family is much harder to tend with than the bees, but Ulee determination will make reconciliation just as effect as his beekeeping. As I mentioned, Casey is a punk, who changes for the better. Helen is a junkie, who changes for the better. Penny is depressed and heartbroken, who gets better. Ulee's best fiends died in the war and his wife passed away, but his will to flee his demons and bring his family back together are all great.While the acting and character development are all perfect, the only criticism I'd give would be that the movie tends to drag on in some parts. Not a big deal, so whatever.

This is one of those films that comes as a surprise, hardly heard of yet well reviewed by some serious critics. Seeing the name Johnathan Demme appear on the credits along with Peter Fonda had me suspecting yet another re-run of "Fighting Mad" but insightful director, writer, editor, Victor Nunez plays it more like a character study. Nunez also tends to have an affinity for working within the Florida landscape as several of his features have this exotic setting. Apart from a couple of nasty drug oriented sequences (integral to the story) and some unnecessary language, I was reminded of a couple of the better episodes from Budd Shulberg's low budget TV series from the 60s "The Everglades" (remember that terrific theme song?) Having been most impressed by Peter Fonda's own production (with the marvelous Warren Oates) "The Hired Hand" in '71 (probably his most mature work to date), I was drawn to giving 'Ulee's' a chance viewing. It has the look of a film that's always about to take a turn for the usual Hollywood gung-ho heroic's but here, the writing's far more laid back and introspective. It slowly weaves its way to a rather well thought out and tad more believable conclusion. Action fans may be disappointed but for those who enjoy a more leisurely pace, free of over done CGI, this could entertain. Acting by the principal characters is uniformly good:- Fonda, with young Jessica Biel and Penny Jackson as grandaughters, do well in bringing to life a disenfranchised family unit doing it tough. Director of Photography Virgil Morano and Music score composer Charles Engstrom add nicely to the overall atmosphere. A movie like this would have been a real surprise to the film companies in '97 who were all looking for mindless blockbuster action epics to sell to the masses - they simply would not have known what to do with it!. A little picture that's worth a look if you're in the right mood or for those who want to see Peter Fonda nearly 30 years after the more successful but somehow over-rated 'Easy Rider'.Foot note: The film also gives us a fairly detailed introduction to the art of Bee Keeping and Honey extraction in difficult locations.

It's hard for me to watch Ulee's Gold without a couple of big juicy tears welling up ten minutes into the film. That's approximately when Ulee Jackson (Peter Fonda), working in his garage, is drawn into a reluctant conversation with his seven-something granddaughter Penny (Vanessa Zima) about the men in his platoon in Vietnam, none of whom survived. "Those were good guys, Penny." "It's so sad," she says. "You like sad?""No, but sometimes inside it makes you quiet." That scene and this poignant statement by an adorable little girl give you the essence of the movie: the bittersweet, calm dignity of an honest man's living struggle. In fifteen minutes through his interactions with people in town and briefly at home, the extraordinarily ordinary person of Ulysses Jackson is established: He's a beekeeper, pursues the excellence of Tupelo honey, keeps things to himself, has lost his wife, is taking care of his two granddaughters (the teen is difficult), their father is in prison for robbery, their mother abandoned them, Ulee is physically beatup, and his honey harvest is due. Shortly thereafter Ulee gets a call from his son Jimmy (Tom Wood) insisting Ulee must visit him now. Jimmy's wife Helen (Christine Dunford) has told Jimmy's former cohorts in crime, Eddie Flowers (Steven Flynn) and Ferris Dooley (Dewey Weber), that Jimmy hid some money from the heist. They have her jacked up on roofies (Rohypnol), held hostage.Jimmy pleads with Ulee to retrieve Helen for purely family-value reasons. That's the key decision in the movie, because you see Ulee—he deplores Helen for running out on her daughters—weighing all the consequences. He does the hardest thing he's ever done by doing the right thing.In an act of immense courage, with a honey crop to harvest, he travels several more hours the next day to rescue Helen. What happens subsequently bears out his worst fears.Yet through these difficulties the family comes together, Ulee begins to open up to another woman Connie Hope (!) (Patricia Richardson), and each of the Jackson women experience growth or redemption. The scene where Ulee and Connie share tender, illuminating conversation over tea in the kitchen is one of my most memorable moments in cinema. Peter Fonda won a Golden Globe for his performance as Ulee Jackson. The younger actresses got a couple of nominations and awards for lesser known ratings orgs, and Victor Nunez got nods in several independent film venues for director and writer. True to the prizes, Fonda does make the film....For my complete review of this movie and for other movie and book reviews, please visit my site TheCoffeeCoaster.com. Thank you.Brian Wright Copyright 2007

Peter Fonda as Ulee did his best to recreate his dad Henry in this film, and was nearly as effective as Henry would have been in the same role. Peter does not have Henry's fiery blue eyes that displayed an inner fierceness that belied his outward calm so Peter, with his mother's looks and his very laid back personality, has to work harder(without appearing to do so) to have a similar Fonda impact but he did it so well here and better than I thought he could. This role was a perfect fit for him and he was terrific in it, and he is a credit to the great Fonda name as a result. Ulee's Gold might have been a Oscar instead of the honey he made as a bee-keeper(Peter was nominated but did not win).As a reclusive and introverted Viet Nam vet with a painful war disability, an extreme family dysfunction, and a declining but backbreaking bee-keeping business that's rapidly facing extinction, Ulee has a lot of hard work and stress interfering with his taxing efforts to just get by from day to day. When thrown into a deadly family crisis caused by his criminal and convict son, he reluctantly gets deeply involved in trying to solve it and almost gets killed for it.Many viewers may think this film was paced too slow, but most filmmakers trying to portray a rural story set in the South get the pacing all wrong, as city boy filmmakers never understand why Southern folks move slowly and seem to think slowly, thereby appearing stupid and/or lazy, so they try to speed up the story and ruin it by doing so. I was a country boy early on and understand that carefully-paced, oven hot-country behavior very well and was pleased that Ulee's Gold was paced just right, which to me was the critical factor in making this film believable, along with the spot-on acting of the lead characters.Pat Richardson of Home Improvement was terrific as the helpful tenant/eventual love interest, as her character's basic human goodness, calmness, and sweet motherly nature showed again an example of perfect casting, as that is Pat.See this good story with lots of tension and realistic Southern pacing, and great acting in the leads. Plus, very interesting visuals of bee-keeping details made this one of my favorite films set in the South.For other great films set in the South, see The Trip To Bountiful, Places in the Heart, and Sling Blade.