NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

Brainsbell The story-telling is good with flashbacks.The film is both funny and heartbreaking. You smile in a scene and get a soulcrushing revelation in the next.

Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

SnoopyStyle It's 1986. Jack Slavin (Daniel Day-Lewis) and his young daughter Rose (Camilla Belle) live in blissful isolation on a former island commune off the east coast. They defend ferociously the local wetland against land developer neighbor Marty Rance (Beau Bridges). He invites Kathleen (Catherine Keener) to live with them and she brings along her sons, Rodney (Ryan McDonald) and Thaddius (Paul Dano). Rose is immediately jealous and tries unsuccessfully to seduce Rodney. Red Berry (Jena Malone) arrives bringing candy for Rodney and sex for Thaddius.The opening act confused me with a seemingly disturbing Jack and Rose relationship. It doesn't help that Rose acts like a jealous lover. It turns into an interesting sexual coming-of-age story for Rose as she tries to seduce the new men in her life. Then the last act leaves Jack and Rose back as a weird awkward couple. It's slightly off-putting. The whole movie is filled with interesting performers and slightly off-putting. It's not fulfilling but it does have some interesting bits and pieces.

Chris Smith (RockPortReview) Daniel Day Lewis is one of the greatest actors of his generation. His talent, craft, and commitment to his roles are second to none. Nominated for Best Actor five times by The Academy Awards taking home 3 golden trophies. For "My Left Foot (1990)", "There Will be Blood (2008)" and "Lincoln (2008)". One of his lesser known roles was in the small independent film "The Ballad of Jack & Rose (2005) Directed by his wife Rebecca Miller. It's a story about the relationship between a father and daughter living off the grid on an island off the east coast.Camilla Belle plays Rose the tomboyish teenage daughter who has spent her entire life on the island, sheltered from the rest of the world. Her mom had left the family when she was only five years old and has grown up alone with her father all these years. Jack is the last remaining hold out of an old hippie commune on which they live, unable to let go of the past and his strong ideals of how a society should behave. It's1986 and land developers are starting to infiltrate his sacred island, his battle is mainly with Marty Rance (Beau Bridges). For Jack this means War, but his declining health and lack of support make it an impossible task. Nobody can stop progress. The future will come whether you like it or not.With Rose getting older, about sixteen or so, Jack is forced to think about the future and what will happen when he dies. He starts to feel guilty for keeping Rose away from modern society and what will happen to her when she's on her own. Jack does go to the mainland now and then to shack up with Kathleen (Catherine Keener), a single mother of two teen boys, who is currently living in her mothers basement. They've know each other a while but their relationship has never too serious. To hopefully benefit Rose, Jack pays Kathleen to quit her job and move her kids to live with him on the island. Jack's "experiment" is a bumpy road and awakens feeling and emotion that will change all of them. Rose's emotional state becomes a little erratic to say the least, as Kathleen has now taken over most of Jack's time, this causes her to lash out and rebel in some extreme ways. Not to mention the introduction of two teenage boys. Rodney, is a self conscious and sensitive guy who is questioning his sexuality, while Thaddeus is a skinny womanizing rebel, played by Paul Dano, who also stars opposite Daniel Day Lewis in "There Will be Blood". Jack is surprised and shocked by what he see's in Rose and has to confront the fact that nothing lasts forever and that he has to let her go and experience the world, even if she might get hurt along the way. Operating on a budget of 1.5 million, this is prime example of how a strong story along with strong actors can make a great film.

jeremy3 The movie had the potential to be an insightful look at what happens to an aging hippy (Lewis) when the world changes. However, it never really rose to the challenge. Lewis plays an aging hippy who lives with his teenage daughter on an island off the east coast. He is at war with a developer (Beau Bridges). However, you never get the depth that Jack (Lewis) is angry at development. He appears to resent it, but the only thing he does is work in his garden and look dour.His daughter Rose is a very good and disturbing person. She has been raised in isolation on the island, and has an almost unhealthy attachment to her father. Jack decides to try an "experiment". He is going to bring his girlfriend from the mainland with her two teenage sons. What was he thinking? You can't possibly like Jack much as anything but an irresponsible flake from this point on. It turns out that the older son, who his Mom is trying to make him lose weight because her husband had died from diabetes, is much more mature than Rose. It is the younger son (from "Little Miss Sunshine") who is more of the Don Juan.The confrontation/reconciliation with the developer was probably the best part of the movie. It showed that idealists are compromised and broken by "progress". However, the ending was rather silly, and you never really came to understand the characters in the movie better than superficial impressions. You couldn't really understand how a man would allow his daughter to be part of an "experiment" with two teenage boys (and then somehow regret it all). You don't really identify, nor understand Jack. Rose seemed a little too erratic. Now maybe, that was the point. However, the plot wasn't developed well enough to make one understand that this was the actual point.

paul2001sw-1 'The Ballad of Jack and Rose' tells the story of an ailing radical, living a seemingly idyllic life with his daughter, but with his future threatened by the twin threats of development and his own impending mortality. The real theme is sustainability, in it's broadest sense: Jack's world is environmentally sustainable, but not emotionally or economically so. There are some good performances, and the drama stops short of providing simple resolutions as Jack and Rose look to the future. There is some idealisation, however, of their disappearing lives: writer-director Rebecca Miller gives Jack an inheritance, to free him from the need to make compromises in his life, and a disease (a weak heart) he can bear nobly. The totality of Rose's isolation from the world also seems slightly exaggerated - it seems that, in the normal run of things, that the only person she speaks to is her father. I still liked the film, however; and was moved at its end.