The great recession of 2008 was a defining moment of my own generation, and particularly for those who found themselves stepping out of college into a workforce where there simply wasn’t enough gainful employment to be had. 12 years later, the long-term effects of this have really only begun to be understood. Children are staying home longer, increasing their dependency on their still-working parents, while other graduates took lower-wage positions out of necessity, with that lower wage becoming the standard expectation, even when employment was at its recent peaks.
Of course this wasn’t just a mono-generational concern, as the impact of the recession was perhaps even more detrimental in rural communities across the country, with long-standing institutional hiring bodies like manufacturing plants and factories shutting down and literally shutting off the lifeblood of entire cities and towns, particularly in the hard hit “rust belt”. Nomadland, Chloé Zhao’s newest feature, takes an intimate look at this unfortunate chapter in American history through a somewhat metafictional take through the eyes of someone who lived through the after-effects of the financial devastation of the past decade and how it reshaped the concept of the American dream.
Nomadland is based off the Jessica Bruder novel of the same name, and while Bruder’s work focuses on the phenomenon of American “nomads,” people who travel in camper vans and RV’s across the the country in order to obtain work wherever it may be available, the film version transposes that idea into a semi-fictionalized take by crafting a POV character named Fern (Frances McDormand). Fern, who provides the audience a first-hand account of what this lifestyle entails, continued to the live the small town life after the death of her husband until it no longer became feasible to do so. After the central economic driver of its community (a factory) shut down, not only did the population dry up, but the government itself shut down its existing zip code. Much like many Americans in the wake of the housing bubble’s collapse, Fern had to hit the road in order to survive, and that’s where we begin her journey…living out of a van she’s named “Vanguard” and working a seasonal gig at Amazon. She lives a solitary life, to the point where when she sees friends at the local Wal-Mart who offer her an opportunity to stay with them, she refuses, simply saying, “You don’t need to worry about me. I’m okay.”
But, as all season jobs do, it comes to an end, and Fern has to make a decision about her next move. She doesn’t want to leave her old community, or what’s left of it, but with no work available and an impending lot rental bill due, she’s given little choice but to head south and join up with a small commune of nomads that her friend and mentor Linda May (Linda May) urges her to join. It’s there where Fern learns how to best survive on the road, coping with the new normal, and a trio of friends with whom she’ll maintain some semblance of contact with throughout her ongoing journey, including Dave (David Strathairn), a bit of a slight romantic interest and Swankie (Charlene Swankie), who acts a bit as the emotional anchor of the entire group to an extent and certainly helps harden Fern for the road ahead.
Nomadland is clearly a road film, and it’s one that certainly contains multitudes in terms of the self-growth and discovery that Fern undergoes throughout her various trials, though what’s notable about the film is that it never conforms to one particular formula. There are no major rising and falling actions, nor real emotional battles of any kind. The truth is, Fern has already undergone much of that prior to the story that we see, and everything here is a tale of the aftermath and simply trying to survive in what is basically a wasteland with little to offer someone of her particular stripe. In truth, the actual emotive journey is one the viewer themselves will undergo, likely being exposed to a lifestyle in which they had no concept and then coming to realize the same acceptance and self-reliance that Fern has long steeled herself with. Nomadland is that kind of first-rate experiential cinema, the kind where you become so enveloped by what unfolds in front of you that a piece of the characters leave something behind and you’re a richer viewer because of it.
Some of that experience finds its root in the film’s eye-opening aspects, and some of it is rooted in deep ironies, as its hard to escape the new-found prison by which these individuals find themselves shackled to under the Amazon banner. The very entity that helped drive that community’s source of collective income is now the lone thing that drives that same community back into its embraces every holiday season. It’s a bit stomach churning, and yet, we all continue to feed that same machine of convenience. I’ll probably do it again sometime this week. Not proud of that fact, but we all make due with what we’re given, from these nomads within the running time of this feature to those lucky enough to be higher in the economic scaffold.
The core factor that provides the film its intrinsic spark is Zhao’s approach itself, which is deeply reverential to the reflexive metafiction of Abbas Kiarostami’s own masterpiece Close-Up (a must-watch if you haven’t had the pleasure). This is apparent in her previous feature The Rider, which translated the real-life story of a rodeo cowboy trying to get back in the saddle post-injury through the casting of the actual people with whom the events occurred. One would think that directorial ethos could create difficulties for the amateur performers (and in the wrong hands, like Clint Eastwood’s the 15:17 to Paris, it can), but Zhao has such a deft hand in how she’s able to to hone performances that it just adds to her work’s authenticity. And Nomadland evolves this approach, utilizing an Oscar winning actress and basically dropping her into a cast of actual nomads and other blue collar workers. The contrast provides McDormand with a more fully formed environment to play against as her character undergoes this odyssey, while also heightening the work of those non-actors around her and blending in what appears to also be some level of confessional documentary as well, particularly in a heart-wrenching moment involving the real-life Bob Wells and the loss of his son.
Nomadland is cinematic alchemy, and without a doubt this year’s first truly essential film. Chloé Zhao is a miracle. I’m saddened that much like our reliance on Amazon, she has to go to Marvel to heighten awareness of her work by way of her next project, but if it allows her to continue to produce this kind of vital work, that’s a deal I’m willing to make.
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