A wealthy Hawaiian lawyer, Matt King (George Clooney), is about to sell his family’s huge tract of untouched land when his wife suffers a marine accident and ends up in a coma.  While he struggles to manage his daughters (Shailene Woodley and Amara Miller), he learns that his wife had been cheating on him with a real estate agent who stands to profit from the sale.  After carefully considering the ramifications of the sale to prospective developers and how this will affect the future of the island, he goes against his family’s wishes and decides to keep the land.  His wife eventually dies and he comes to terms with the legacy she has left behind.

The Descendants is, in some ways, the type of Hollywood film in short supply in the 21^st century.  For adults and about serious matters, it is humorous, clever, and not completely predictable, much like writer-director Alexander Payne’s earlier work.  The problems arise from two places.  One is that Clooney’s character is allowed to be far too sympathetic, largely because his comatose wife cannot speak for herself. This smacks of misogyny; his oldest daughter’s quick transformation from rebel wild child to dutiful, responsible daughter (new wife?) doesn’t help.  The other is that the film ends up choosing sentimentality over the more complex, harder edges of Payne’s earlier work.  While it is still a cut above the average Hollywood offering, The Descendants could have been much more with stronger character development and greater complexity of characterization.  ✰ ✰ ½.

MJM  04-21-2012