Matt Damon, the star of ‘Promised land’
FRACKING is a very big issue in Fermanagh at the moment.
Residents are concerned about how this method of gas extraction called Hydraulic Fracturing will affect their lives and the countryside. And the very same issues are concerning the residents of McKinley in Matt Damon’s latest movie ‘Promised Land’.
There have been films made about fracking before, such as 2010 documentary ‘Gasland’, but this is the first time the controversial method of extracting natural gas from deep beneath the ground has got the Hollywood treatment in a film which Damon has partly written.
Maybe Matt Damon is better known to many of you for his Jason Bourne character or for his appearances in the ‘Oceans’ movies but the actor also has a serious side and is both a talented writer and actor, as evidenced by his breakthrough movie ‘Good Will Hunting’ which he starred in and co-wrote with friend Ben Affleck.
In ‘Promised Land’ Damon plays Steve Butler, a corporate salesman for a gas drilling company who is sent to a small town in rural Pennsylvania with colleague Sue Tomason (Frances McDormand) to buy drilling rights on land owned by the townspeople.
McKinley is a rural farming community and has been hit hard by recession so when these two hit town offering big money for ‘rights’ to drill they are very well received by the local inhabitants – which surprises Sue and Steve slightly.
All appears to be going very well for the pair until the locals start to hear there could be a downside to these people ‘bearing gifts’, and the whole issue of damage to the environment, to land, to animals and to water supplies rears its head.
In no time Steve and Sue find McKinley turning against them and the issue goes to a town vote. Meanwhile the pair’s bosses are getting impatient, frustrated that the whole thing isn’t signed and sealed by this stage.
Matt Damon’s Steve starts to doubt his own sales pitch and starts to develop empathy for the people of McKinley as his conscience starts to get the better of him.
We’ve seen this type of thing before. City slicker heads to Hicksville to steam roll over the locals but discovers the locals are real people with real feelings. And the city slicker (s) start to think maybe what they’re doing is wrong and/or immoral.
And there is often a pretty little girl in Hicksville who the city slicker just happens to fall for. In McKinley the ‘pretty little girl’ is Alice (Rosemarie DeWitt).
‘Promised Land’ may not provide all the answers to do with fracking – good or bad – but it certainly puts forward a strong case for the anti-fracking lobby.
Slow paced, yet with strong performances ‘Promised Land’ may not be to all tastes but it could prove popular in places like Fermanagh where fracking could soon be an uncomfortable reality.
