The Hero

— Sam Elliott plays a once popular western star now in his early 70s and doing voiceovers for commercials. He’s been divorced for years and is estranged from his daughter, but he isn’t the cliché “old guy” we’re used to seeing in films. Instead, he’s just trying to survive while coming to terms with a life of missed opportunities, with past notoriety now mostly gone, and with considerably fewer days ahead of him than behind him. His fairly quiet life shifts in another direction when he meets a young woman with whom an unlikely romance eventually blossoms at about the same time he’s diagnosed with cancer. Elliott does a remarkable job of maneuvering the shifts and cycles, living in the here and now while his past pushes heavily on him. There’s a bit more sentimentality than I like and, after developing such a realistic character, I was a little dismayed when they chose a May/December romance as the vehicle to allow him to move forward, but through it all, Elliott is mesmerizing and you can't take your eyes off him any more than you can turn a deaf ear to his smooth voice. It’s not as full or layered as last year’s “I’ll See You in My Dreams”, but you can't help but see the similarities in both films.

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[2017. 93 min. Directed by Brett Haley. Starring Sam Elliott, Laura Prepon, Krysten Ritter, Nick Offerman, and Katherine Ross.]
http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-hero-2017