Stillwater

 

In Tom McCarthy's Stillwater, a bulky Matt Damon plays Bill Baker, an Oklahoma roughneck on a mission to free his daughter, Allison (a fine Abigail Breslin) from a prison in Marseille. While studying at university, Allison was found guilty of killing her Arab girlfriend. During one of their visits, Allison asks her father to pass along a tip to her lawyer that might clear her of the murder. The information is not persuasive to the lawyer but leads Bill to enlist the help of his neighbor, Virginie (Camille Cottin) in finding the real killer.

Damon's Bill is a dutiful but dour mass of regret, as he lumbers through the winding streets of Marseille, hoping to prove his daughter's innocence and earn her respect, which he lost during his years as a drunken ne-er-do-well. Damon's performance, and he appears in nearly every scene of this beautifully shot film, feels measured and meticulous, and lends gravitas even to some of the narrative elements that don't quite square. Damon's scenes with Breslin are especially compelling.

Despite its length (2:20), Stillwater is does not drag; the narrative, while ostensibly a murder mystery, is mostly an insightful exploration of the foreign in the age of raging nationalism.