"World Traveler" could be a video for Bruce Springsteen's "Hungry Heart" - "Got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack/ I went out for a ride and I never went back/ Like a river that don't know where it's flowing/ I took a wrong turn and I just kept going. . ./Everybody needs a place to rest/ Everybody wants to have a home/ Don't make no difference what nobody says/ Ain't nobody like to be alone."
Instead, writer/director Bart Freundlich uses that ultimate road warrior Willie Nelson and his songs, particularly some recent duets, as the expressive soundtrack, concluding with "Across the Borderline": "When you reach the broken promise land,/ Every dream slips through your hand,/ You'll know it's too late to change your mind./ 'Cause you paid the price to come to far,/ Just to wind up where you are,/ And you're still just across the borderline./. . . Hope remains when pride is gone,/ And it keeps you moving on,/ Calling you across the borderline./ And you're still just across the borderline."
I'd follow Billy Crudup just about anywhere in the movies, so I gave this picaresque, existential introspection space, especially admiring Terry Stacey's cinematography. He has a European's appreciation for going across the U.S. Utilizing Crudup's chiseled visage to critical effect in the script as if it were written specifically for him, his character's alcoholic break-down is mostly visual, through akimbo body language and his dreams, as he knock-hockeys off a series of even more seeking or troubled characters until his meeting up with his past and what could be his future seem to straighten him out.
The opening and closing NYC setting shots of the World Trade Center of course tell us what day this was filmed before. (originally filmed 5/4/2002)
Instead, writer/director Bart Freundlich uses that ultimate road warrior Willie Nelson and his songs, particularly some recent duets, as the expressive soundtrack, concluding with "Across the Borderline": "When you reach the broken promise land,/ Every dream slips through your hand,/ You'll know it's too late to change your mind./ 'Cause you paid the price to come to far,/ Just to wind up where you are,/ And you're still just across the borderline./. . . Hope remains when pride is gone,/ And it keeps you moving on,/ Calling you across the borderline./ And you're still just across the borderline."
I'd follow Billy Crudup just about anywhere in the movies, so I gave this picaresque, existential introspection space, especially admiring Terry Stacey's cinematography. He has a European's appreciation for going across the U.S. Utilizing Crudup's chiseled visage to critical effect in the script as if it were written specifically for him, his character's alcoholic break-down is mostly visual, through akimbo body language and his dreams, as he knock-hockeys off a series of even more seeking or troubled characters until his meeting up with his past and what could be his future seem to straighten him out.
The opening and closing NYC setting shots of the World Trade Center of course tell us what day this was filmed before. (originally filmed 5/4/2002)