Review of North Country (2005) by Sapphire G — 25 Jul 2011

Riding high off her Oscar win for 'Monster', Charlize Theron (The Road) picked up this sexual harassment/legal drama that is about as cliché and Oscar-baiting as they come. Look, Theron is beautiful and gives another good performance, but this film is so rife with stereotypes and demeans the working class - both sexes.

Yes, I get it, men should treat women with respect and not harass them as the women in this film were, but any logical person can see right through the veil the filmmakers are trying to pull over their eyes.

This is Oscar bait at its finest - or worst, depending on how you look at it. Co-stars Frances McDormand (Fargo), Sissy Spacek (Get Low), Richard Jenkins (Let Me In), Sean Bean (Death Race 2), and Michelle Monaghan (Due Date) shine, while Woody Harrelson (The Messenger) and Jeremy Renner (The Town) - who was a nobody back then, you know, before he was cast in 'The Hurt Locker' and everybody went gaga over him, despite his relative lack of acting ability - are pretty one dimensional.

However, compared to the clichéd blue collar men, these characters have super depth. No doubt that men who work in a steel mind are dirty (physically and mentally), but this movie makes them all look like pigs with one objective: humiliate any woman who attempts to work at the mine.

Yeah, I'm sure there were men that did just that, and it's not really a stretch of the imagination that management didn't really do anything to stop it, but this movie plays out like too many Oscar-bait films: make the woman the helpless victim and portray the men as vile, greedy pigs.

It's lazy filmmaking, it's predictable down to the dialogue, and it won't do much for those outside the select group who still think this kind of thing happens. The material is unworthy of the talent assembled for the film.