It is rare to find a film nowadays that will make you stop and think about what is, what could be and what should truly be. Matt Ross' directorial effort, Captain Fantastic, stars Viggo Mortensen [The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (2001-2003), A History of Violence (2005)] as Ben, a father who has decided, along with his wife, to recounce the established society and its rules. So they've taken their six children and after having lived on a farm, they've moved to the woods.
The family has turned its back to anything that is considered standard to us all. They hunt for a living, they do not follow any organised religion - instead, they admire people who have proven their intellectual worth such as Noam Comsky- and they educate themselves by reading everything and anything - from quantic engineering to literary masterpieces and from international relations to philosophy. All six kids have been given unique and original names so that there can only be one of them in the whole world and they are all a happy, self-conscious and well-organised family. Or so they seem.
We quickly find out that the mother has been hospitalised for the past few months and one day before the beginning of the movie she committed suicide. So now, the family wants to attend her funeral and persuade their relatives that Mother was a buddhist who did not believe in organised religions and would not like to be buried as a Christian. However, her father [Frank Langella (Frost/Nixon (2008))] believes that it is Ben's wrong choices that led his daughter to suicide and threatens to put him behind bars should he appear to the funeral.
Thus, a journey -both literal and sentimental - begins, as the Cash family travels to see their mother one last time. Simultaneously, Ben experiences an internal conflict: has he made the right choice to give the best education possible to his children, unaffected by any outside factors, in exchange, however, for their social education -and total lack of it-? Also, has he been so blinded by his hatred for the establishment that he never saw his wife's problems that ended to her suicide?
Matt Ross' film belongs to that sort of movies that introduce us to a rather original idea (at least one I do not remember having seen in the recent past) and take us to a journey along with their characters making us contemplate about their actions and reasoning behind them. The audience gets to think about the meaning and point of education. When is it good and thorough? When does it become indoctrinating and when is it purely bad? And what about parenting? Ben has given everything to his kids. He has freed them from the system and he has informed them about everything, making them complete human beings. But has he been a good father or an abusive one? Viggo Mortensen, who has always made good acting choices, presents this internal dilemma in a discreet way and lets the audience make their own decision before he makes his.
As for me, as I was watching this quite poignant movie that made me think for days afterwards, (and which destroyed the characterisation "interesting" for me, let me tell you - watch it and you will understand), all that came to my mind was an ancient greek phrase: moderation is best. You see, sometimes neither too much nor too little is the right choice and Captain Fantastic's story was certainly one of those occasions.
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