The Station Agent

Fin: It's funny how people see me and treat me since I'm really just a simple, boring person.

The Station Agent, directed by Tom McCarthy, is a quiet film, sometimes funny, sometimes serious, much like its characters' lives that it manages to portray so realistically. It tells the story of Fin (Peter Dinklage), a train enthusiast and dwarf who, after the death of a friend, moves to an abandoned train station to live in quiet solitude. While there, he becomes friends with Joe (Bobby Cannavale), an aggressively friendly, cheerful man who forces his way into Fin's life, and Olivia (Patricia Clarkson), an artist in mourning over her young son's death. As the three become friends, they are forced to confront the problems they have been trying to ignore and become part of the community they have shunned.

This is a quiet film without the strong emotional peaks and valleys of an ordinary drama but instead with gentle slopes that make it seem as though we know these people, that we're simply peeking into the window of their lives. The performances are especially convincing, especially Peter Dinklage who manages to express so much with so little. Each character is someone we can recognize with problems we can relate to. Fin feels ostracized because of his dwarfism and so cuts himself off from people and opportunities in order to avoid becoming a spectacle but by making himself so much of a mystery he becomes more of one. But as people continue to force their way into his life, led by the charmingly irrepressible Joe, he finds there are a whole town full of people willing to accept him as he is. Joe is the heart of the film. He is the only one to not get bogged down by his personal problems and instead almost bullheadedly insists on befriending the two most troubled and reclusive people in town by his positivity and open mindedness. Olivia has run away to this small town to try and recover from her loss but she is unable to let go of the past. The three of them have incredible chemistry in a plot that never rushes the relationships which helps add to the realism and depth.

The Station Agent is a wonderful film about the value of community and the power of friendship in times of trouble. Though it takes it's time, it is itself timeless with likable characters and a realistic look at the world make it a sweet, unforgettable story.