Nomadland: An American Elegy 2021 Wandervision

By Joshua Khoury

Chloe Zhao’s Oscar-winning third feature, Nomadland, is the story of a sixty-year-old widower, Fern (Frances McDormand), whose town falls victim to the GFC and is forced to close down. She is forced out, rendered not homeless, but “houseless”, as she says. She begins living in an RV, and meets and befriends other nomads for whom conventional society was unviable.

There is no antagonist. A love story presents itself to Fern, but she has it stay strictly hypothetical, and the plot is sparse. Some may find it slow, but I think it’s more just unconventional narrativewise. This is lyrical, deeply elegant cinema, set to a minimal piano score. A movie of second-to-last breaths, of senescence. The characters it depicts are seniors, and multiple are also dealing with grim prognosis. These are people who have been left out to dry by the country they’ve worked for their entire lives. Zhao’s portrayal of America is one that explores late stage capitalism and its synonymous decay. The American Dream’s white picket fence is fundamentally anti-nomadic, and so Nomadland feels politically timely, but remains apartisan, in a way I found truly refreshing in the current climate of ubiquitous hyper politicisation.

The sense of decomposition that dominates the film literally and symbolically, finds its perfect complement in the infinity of the landscapes. Joshua James Richards’ digital cinematography is gorgeous, and more than most movies, I really don’t think it would feel right shot on film. I must dissent slightly and say I felt it borrowed too much from the documentarian. Zhao’s cinema, though, is predominantly observational, but for me the resulting objectivity created a slight distance between the camera and its subject. Despite this, other than a couple of cheesy Shakespeare quotes, the film’s naturalism is convincing and its worldbuilding is utterly absorbing.

This ties into my main gripe with Nomadland –– the unclear status it gives truth. The film is based upon Jessica Bruder’s Nomadland: Surviving American in the Twenty-First Century, a non-fiction book. Much of Fern’s backstory is lifted from historical fact, and many, if not most of the film’s characters are played by their real-life counterparts. Their performances are convincing and natural. And then, in the middle, is McDormand. She won an Oscar for her performance and she certainly deserved it; McDormand blends seamlessly and believably into the non-professional cast, but this is problematic. She is fantastic, but if her performance is so remarkable for its naturalness (and it is), we must wonder why she’s in the film at all, and why the role didn’t go to another nonprofessional real-life nomad. Other than the fact that she optioned the rights to the book, the answer is surely because she is Frances McDormand –– she will draw crowds and money (and Oscars). Zhao’s audience knows who she is, because Nomadland is more arthouse than blockbuster, and because McDormand has the most best actor/actress Oscars of anyone living. Regardless of the extent to which the real nomads were or weren’t playing themselves, their unrecognizability lends them, and the film, a simplistic but important sense of truthfulness. Zhao asks us to perform doublethink insofar as we must be drawn to the cinema knowing McDormand stars and then instantly forget this as soon as we fade in. But it worked. Nomadland was made for more than Zhao’s two other pictures’ (combined) net grosses, and collected three Oscars of its own.

I wonder if cinema can ever really criticise capitalism? Probably, but Hollywood cinema? Hollywood cinema made by a major studio (Fox Searchlight), directed by the daughter of an industrialist billionaire (Zhao Yuji)? What are the ethics of McDormand (worth $30 million) pretending to be homeless –– or houseless –– alongside people who really are? I don’t know. Zhao observes more than she (explicitly) criticises but it is at least ironic that the film was so lauded by an awards ceremony which, with its self-congratulatory statuettes, embodies much of what it criticises –– and that it’s available for streaming on Disney+.

I love McDormand, but if she had the restraint to stay a producer and not play the lead too I wonder if, despite garnering less “buzz” and financial success, Nomadland would be able to stand up better down the line, when the importance of such things has dissipated. But can we blame such a fantastic but underworked actor for leaping at the chance to play such an interesting character? Maybe she will dominate the minds of most viewers less than she did mine. Some people will see her presence as a non-issue, and fair enough. Nonetheless, it is an incredible performance in a gorgeous, moving film; just one whose paradoxes run deeper than its title’s oxymoron.