When your born in the middle of nowhere in South Dakota, where there is nothing but plains, cold, horses and cattle your life options are very limited. You’re probably going to be poor and working on a farm, or training horses or riding dangerous animals in a Rodeo bucking bronco contests hoping you don’t get kicked in the head and become brain damaged for life. This is the story of “The Rider” about a young man who is kicked in the head by a horse in a Rodeo and his life after the accident. Obviously these are all not very good life options, but when your are born and live in the middle of nowhere and live in a trailer with no money, what are your alternatives? As I have said in this blog before with other films I have reviewed, “you’re going along for the ride”. We are all the products of our parents, our DNA and where we are born.

Very unusual for this movie is that the characters are fictional but the actors in “The Rider” are the actual people who lived through the real events in this story. One of the actors is Lilly Jandreau who is the mentally disabled sister of Brady Jandreau who was brain damaged in the Rodeo accident. The main character Brady Blackburn, played by Brady Jandreau does not have severe brain damage and despite his severe injury throughout most of this film, seems to be able to function normally. Another actor in this film was not as lucky and his brain damage was severe and some of the most depressing scenes in this movie involve his struggles in the hospital while Brady visited him.

The ratings for this movie are very high 97% on Rotten Tomatoes, but my rating for this movie is more in the 70% range, mainly because the film dragged too long in several areas and I thought there was enough of a story to tell. The huge vistas of South Dakota were impressively filmed, providing one good reason to see this movie. I thought this was a very simple story, very well told, but due to the other problems, I give The Rider only a marginal recommendation.

In some ways, the movie “Disobedience” reminds me of last years “Call Me by Your Name” that I did not like. The difference here is that two adult women know that they are gay but the devout Jewish community they live in make their relationship almost impossible.

The two women in this story are played by Rachel McAdams and Rachel Weisz. McAdams plays Esti, who is woman married to a Rabbi and after her relationship with Roni, played by Weisz she was disowned by her father and left home for good only returning for this funeral.

The story and message in this film are good ones – be yourself first and never live your life based on the opinions or even religious beliefs of other people. I hated the constant chain smoking mostly by Weisz’s character and the fact that so many movies are still funded by cigarette companies is a disgusting practice that has to stop.

I admired the courage of both McAdams and Weisz with one sex scene that I thought had one way over the top moment – as did Call me by your Name and the fact the neither one of them wore makeup throughout the entire film. Most of this movie was shot in dark, lower middle class environments both inside and outside that I found rather depressing for the whole two hours. At certain points the story dragged on too long, mainly because there was not enough of a story to tell. The ratings for this movie on Rotten Tomatoes are very high 88% that I agree with only because of the acting, not for the overall movie.

Only for the quality of the acting, I recommend Disobedience.

Melissa McCarthy is one of the most likable comedic actors to come around in many years and it has been her likability rather than the quality of the movies she has made that has contributed to her longevity with a so many films in recent years. Her new movie “Life of the Party” also takes advantage of McCarthy’s likability rather than the quality of the script that was written by McCarthy and her husband Ben Falcone. The screenplay for this movie reads like it was a series of disjointed vignette’s – rather than a story that flows into a beginning, middle and end. Each story within this film is almost standalone, going for a big laugh each time and in the audience I was in there were very few laughs, unfortunately.

This is a movie entirely for big fans of Melissa McCarthy and not for people who like a very good comedy movie. For this reason I give this movie a marginally negative review.