And so with his directorial debut, the thirty-four-year-old has plunged headlong into domestic drama with this adaptation of Richard Ford’s novel Wildlife (1990), where spousal and parental relationships suffer and disintegrate as a result of external social pressures, innate selfishness, and insecurity.

The setting is Great Falls, Montana, in 1960. Jerry (Jake Gyllenhaal, moving seamlessly into middle-aged roles) lives with his wife, Jeanette (Carey Mulligan), and their fourteen-year-old son, Joe (Ed Oxenbould). Jerry is a groundsman and lackey at a golf club, and Jeanette is a housewife. This blue-collar nuclear family struggles to get by in a grimly uncultured town, the so-called ‘Affluent Society’ of the Eisenhower years having left them behind as they live pay check to pay check in a modest suburban rental.

The first spark of discontent comes when Jerry is sacked for being too familiar with the club’s patrons, causing him to suffer a prolonged depression until he takes a job fighting a daunting wild fire in the nearby mountains. Jerry must leave home for several weeks. Initially upset, his wife soon takes up with the ageing and wealthy local businessman Warren Miller, played with sweaty, wheezing vileness by Bill Camp.

Carey Mulligan as Jeanette Brinson and Jake Gyllenhaal as Jerry Brinson in Paul Dano's Wildlife (photo by IFC Films)

The heart of the film is the effect of these events on Joe, a character presented by Dano (and Zoe Kazan, who co-wrote the screenplay) as a bastion of innocence undeserving of the trauma and heartache inflicted upon him by his absurd parents. Not only must Joe witness his mother’s physical relationship with Miller at horribly close quarters, he must endure her treating him as romantic confidant and assistant in her attempt to regain her individuality, but in a way that flirts with the boundaries of appropriateness. Mulligan is outstanding in these uncomfortable scenes between mother and son, while Oxenbould – who hails from Sydney and is a student at Newtown School of Performing Arts – wears a permanent expression of bewildered fear that is highly disquieting. Joe is further scarred by his father’s violent and drunken reaction to his mother’s affair, a final nail in the coffin of family unity that ensures Joe’s home life will be much changed as he continues his adolescence. It is worth noting that Oxenbould’s Joe is exactly the kind of role and performance that we might have expected of Dano himself much earlier in his career, in its poetic expression of silently endured angst.

This sombre film, with its thin plot, tiny cast, and beautifully controlled pacing, script, and cinematography is a reflection on the tediousness and humdrum nature of domestic disharmony and strained family dynamics. Unlike many other films, Wildlife shows how, amid the blazing arguments and meltdowns, the chores of day-to-day life must relentlessly continue, albeit under a heavy cloud, and herein lies perhaps the greatest melancholy. Dinners must still be made, clothes washed, homework done. The film shows how the minutiae of existence are infused with an oppressive languor, as a result of emotional upheaval with our supposed loved ones. It is striking how unspectacular, how thoroughly mundane a family falling apart can be. 

Carey Mulligan as Jeanette Brinson, Ed Oxenbould as Joe Brinson, and Jake Gyllenhaal as Jerry Brinson in Paul Dano's Wildlife (photo by IFC Films)

Wildlife is not among Ford’s most acclaimed novels. Nevertheless, Dano’s film has a distinctly literary quality to it and, interestingly, taps into a number of familiar themes of twentieth-century American literature. For example, Jerry works at a golf club because in his youth he was a promising golfer (this part of his back-story is explored more fully in the book than in the film) without ever fulfilling his potential. This echoes John Updike’s Harry ‘Rabbit’ Angstrom and his jarring transition from the heights of high-school basketball stardom to his mediocre sales job, the ongoing humiliations of adult life, and the anti-climax of the American Dream.

Perhaps more impressive, and linked with this, is Dano’s exploration of the nature of work and employment. When Jerry is still at the golf club, there is a memorable scene when he shines the shoes of two golfers as they sip beer – the camera angle, and the viewer, down at their feet with Jerry. In this scene, and in Jerry’s kowtowing to his manager, Wildlife exposes the alienation and infantilisation that is inherent in workplace hierarchies – both in 1960 and today. Conversely, when Jerry loses his job, he sinks to varying depths of despair at being excluded from the workforce and often can’t bring himself to leave the sofa. In both of these scenarios, there is something of Theodore Dreiser’s dramatisations of how, for some, there is belittlement and ignominy both in the workplace and in the estrangement from it. This is hardly Wildlife’s dominant theme, yet it is a point subtly woven through the film.

Carey Mulligan as Jeanette Brinson in Paul Dano's Wildlife (photo by Scott Garfield/IFC Films)

Stylistically and visually, the film is comparable with some of Jim Jarmusch’s works, particularly in its quietness. Generally, Wildlife has a rather claustrophobic mood, yet the tension that builds up through prolonged time spent in household interiors gets spectacular release with sweeping shots over the Rocky Mountain Front and the stunning footage of the wild fire itself when Jeanette and Joe visit it.

A notable feature of this film is that it is not absolutely clear which character is the lead – a testament to Dano and Kazan’s screenplay, and to Ford’s novel. Whether sympathies lie most with Jeanette, Joe, or Jerry may depend on the viewer’s experience and persuasions. There can be no ambiguity, however, about the unique cinematic instincts of Dano, who has undoubtedly brought his sensitivity and grace as an actor to the director’s chair. 

Wildlife (Roadshow Films) 104 minutes, directed by Paul Dano. In cinemas 1 November 2018 . Screening courtesy of Brisbane International Film Festival.

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