A Little Prayer
The final scene of Angus MacLachlan’s “A Little Prayer” crystalizes everything we’ve come to know about David Strathairn’s Bill in such a beautiful way, and it is because we are hearing it said by another person. Bill is a father like many others, someone trying to navigate their adult children’s lives- and still exert some control over them- even though, the older children get, the less likely they are to take this advice. That’s because, at a certain point, adult children tend to go off on their own path, regardless of whether it’s the one that their parents would want for them or not. I think that anyone who’s found themselves in the role of a caregiver can probably empathize with Bill. This is an exceptional, wonderful performance by Strathairn as he starts to realize that during the microcosm of this film’s 91 minutes.
Bill and his wife, Venida (Celia Weston), should be empty nesters at this time in their lives, but family is constantly around them. This is- in part- because Bill works with his son, David (Will Pullen), and David’s wife Tammy (Jane Levy) has stayed with them often, in part because of David’s time in the military. In addition to them, their daughter Patti (Anna Camp) also rides into town with her child, getting away from her husband who- we learn- has a myriad of issues himself. When Bill catches on that David is cheating on Tammy, however, the tension in the family is ramped up to 11.
“A Little Prayer” is ultimately a quiet character movie, even if it feels like it relies on contrivances every now and then. The emotions in the characters that MacLachlan has created, however, are genuine, and our grounding in the story comes from Bill and Venida. They are the heart of this story, and every once in a while, we get scenes with them where exposition is revealed because Venida has learned things, and she needs to tell Bill. It’s during one of these scenes where the catalyst for the third act is revealed, and as much as Venida is the listener, Bill is a doer. He feels like he needs to do something, because that is what he- and a lot of men in his generation- are hardwired to do. What we see are the limits of that mentality, as he finds himself coming up against the uncomfortable truth that- for a lot of people in his orbit- his actions are not needed; they will make the choices they make regardless of what he does. Part of why that last scene hit me as hard as it did is because it feels like validation for the way he’s tried to live his life, from someone whose life would not have been the same without him. A filmmaker cannot force that type of moment to come through; his actors have to allow it to come through themselves, and the result is one of my favorite moments in a film this year.
