In this case, the film’s protagonist is a quartet of Sudanese children who are orphaned when their rural village is destroyed by rebels fighting a brutal civil war in the mid-1980s (this particular historical atrocity has been the subject of several excellent documentaries, including 2003’s Lost Boys of the Sudan and 2006’s God Grew Tired of Us). Walking hundreds of miles and struggling to survive in the harsh environs of sub-Saharan Africa (at one point they must drink their own urine to stave off dehydration), they wind up in a refugee camp in Kenya where they wait, and wait, and wait. The leader of the group, Mamere (Arnold Oceng), is the chief by default because all of the older boys have been killed or captured, including his brother Theo (Okwar Jale), who sacrifices himself for the group and whose loss weighs heavily on Mamere’s conscience. He survives along with his sister, Abital (Kuoth Wiel), and two friends, Jeremiah (Ger Duany) and Paul (Emmanuel Jal), and after 13 years they are granted asylum in the U.S., where a faith-based charity sets them up in an apartment in Kansas City and helps them find jobs and integrate into American culture. Unfortunately, Abital is separated from the men and sent to Boston because the charity was unable to secure a host family for her in Kansas City.

Much of the film’s middle section involves the men’s various attempts to assimilate, and the films generates some good-natured humor from their sense of cultural and social dislocation, although some of it goes on a bit longer than it should. Mamere and Jeremiah get jobs stocking shelves at a grocery store, and both men are perplexed to see perfectly good food being thrown away each day because of expiration dates. Paul gets a job on an assembly line, where he meets two stoners who threaten to lead him astray with the lure of drugs and complacency. Complacency is not a word that sits well with Mamere, who is determined to educate himself and go to medical school. It is during his English language education that he learns the concept of the “good lie” from a discussion of Huckleberry Finn, which will help fuel a crucial sacrifice he makes at the film’s climax.

As you may have noted, there has been no mention of Witherspoon’s character in the past two paragraphs because she exists largely at the margins, providing necessary material support for Mamere, Jeremiah, and Paul and slowly going through a personal transformation in which she grows to see them as complex human beings, rather than simply African immigrants, a journey that the film is clearly intending the audience to take, as well. The idea of putting a human face on a recent historical atrocity is a noble one, and The Good Lie does it well, especially by foregrounding the Sudanese characters and viewing the story through their development, rather than the Western characters. In addition to Witherspoon’s Carrie, there are several other important Americans who aid the protagonists, including Carrie’s boss, Jack (Corey Stoll), who at first resists getting involved but later becomes a crucial part of their lives, and Pamela (Sarah Baker), a chipper Christian charity worker who evolved from being a smiley punch-line to one of the film’s more intriguing figures.

Director Philippe Falardeau, a French Canadian who made an impact a few years ago on the art-hour circuit with Monsieur Lazhar (2011), an Oscar-nominated drama that also centers on cultural dislocation, balances The Good Lie’s potential mawkishness with both humor and humanity. The film hits the expected beats when characters come together, recognize the error of their ways, and do the right thing, and to describe it as “feel good” wouldn’t be entirely off-base, even if that tends to carry a somewhat pejorative charge in certain critical circles. He and screenwriter Margaret Nagle, a veteran of television movies and series making her feature film debut, build in plenty of drama, but it doesn’t always develop in the directions you might expect (Paul’s temptation with drugs and frustration with being a nobody in America is interestingly tempered before it has a chance to take off). Instead, they focus on the interpersonal connections, driving the film with a sense of humane understanding and willingness on the part of both Americans and Africans to see past obvious differences and recognize their shared humanity.

Copyright ©2014 James Kendrick

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