Bozeman Magazine

What would your life look like without you in it? Wakefield, showing 7:30 pm on Saturday, July 1st at the Ellen Theatre, is a provocative look at what it means to walk away from it all. Outwardly, Howard Wakefield (Bryan Cranston) is the picture of success. He has a loving wife (Jennifer Garner) and two daughters, a prestigious job as a Manhattan lawyer, and a comfortable home in the suburbs. Inwardly, though, he’s suffocating. One day, something snaps and Howard goes into hiding in his garage attic. Leaving his family to wonder what happened to him, he observes them from the attic window—an outsider spying in on his own life. Faithfully adapted from E.L. Doctorow’s 2008 short story of the same name, writer-director Robin Swicord (“The Jane Austen Book Club”) has crafted a sharp and singularly bitter portrait of man at his worst, driven by a tour de force performance by Cranston, who seems to be having the time of his life playing a character who would make Walter White look like father of the year.

The Patriot Ledger film critic Al Alexander writes; “Cranston, as much as you hate his character, is magnificent. No shock there. But what is surprising—and pleasantly so—is Garner, who does almost all of her acting without a word of dialogue.” Far from an action-packed thriller, this cerebral look deep inside a very disturbed mind is as hypnotic as it is unsettling—a fraught meditation on marriage and identity, as Howard slowly realizes that he has not in fact left his family, he has left himself. Rated R, the film runs 106 minutes.

Tickets are $8.75/GA; $8.50/Seniors & Students (plus fees), available online at www.thellentheatre.com, or in person at the box office. The Ellen Theatre lobby opens at 630 pm for concession and bar; seating begins at 7:00 pm, show begins at 7:30 pm. Visit www.bozemanfilmsociety.org for more information — “Keep ‘Em Flickering!”