Get low

Senior citizens are a steady niche market. They may not be as profitable as teens (valued for their consumption of popcorn and soft drinks), but they do flock to old-timers having vicarious fun on a big screen. Robert Duvall is now a very old-timer (80), and Bill Murray (60) and Sissy Spacek (61) are looking their ages too, and their charming performances in Get Low should have attracted a bigger box office. Yet, despite costing only US$7 million, it earned loss-making gross takings of only US$9 million (and just 5% extra globally).

In 1938, in Tennessee, a real old backwoods hermit called Felix decided to hold his funeral before he died. From this semi-mythical personality, US TV screenwriters Chris (Mad Men) Provenzano and Gaby Mitchell crafted a wry vehicle for Duvall. They added co-starring roles for Murray (exploitative funeral director), Spacek (old flame), Lucas (Tokyo Drift) Black (Murray's young assistant) and a veteran black actor, Bill Cobbs (76), as a preacher.

The indie production signed cinematographer and TV (Murder One) director Aaron Schneider for his debut feature; he was already an Oscar-co-winner for the 40-minute Short Film (Live Action) adaptation of a William Faulkner story (Two Soldiers, 2003). Schneider edited the movie too, neatly, and the lush photography of woodlands, carpentry and period settings creates an appealing framework for a simple tale of an old man seeking forgiveness for a 40-year-old tragedy.

For much of the time, an intriguing air of mystery builds up, well supported by Duvall's bogeyman of seemingly ill-intentioned aloofness, Murray's manipulative wrinkled smiles and Spacek's loving goodness. The actors and the story appear deliberately restrained, with a comic edge worthy of the Coen brothers; surprises and twists are anticipated. Wrongly: when the final scenes of closure arrive, the promising story becomes a disappointing sequence of anti-climaxes and sentimental Hollywood cliches.

Budget-conscious modern senior citizens are possibly even more likely than teens to take notice of word-of-mouth and social network critiques for a movie. Maybe they'll rent the DVD.