At Any Price

In the competitive world of modern, high-tech agriculture, Henry Whipple (Dennis Quaid)—an ambitious, third-generation farmer—is in a bind. With his elder son climbing mountains in South America, Henry wants his younger son Dean (Zac Efron) to help grow the family's 3,700-acre, Iowa seed-farming empire. Repeating the capitalist mantra, “expand or die,” Henry visits funeral parlors and cemeteries, determined to buy the deceased's land at bargain prices from children uninterested in pursuing their parents' hardscrabble life. But sullen, rebellious Dean hopes to become a professional stock car driver on the NASCAR circuit. When an accident sidelines Dean's dreams and an investigation into Whipple's unscrupulous practice of cleaning and re-selling patented seeds is exposed, father and son are pushed into an unexpected crisis that threatens the future of their business. After an exceptional series of indie films (Man Push Cart, Chop Shop and Goodbye Solo) about the American Dream, Iranian-American writer-director Ramin Bahrani's latest suffers from a disappointing, cliché-riddled script featuring a hated rival (Clancy Brown) and a town hottie (Heather Graham), as well as not-so-subtle references to the debates surrounding the ownership of genetically modified seeds developed by corporations like Monsanto. Optional. [Note: DVD/Blu-ray extras include audio commentary by director Ramin Bahrani and star Dennis Quaid, a Toronto International Film Festival Q&A with Quaid, costar Zac Efron, and others (14 min.), rehearsal footage (6 min.), trailers, and a bonus UltraViolet copy of the film. Bottom line: a decent extras package for a cinematic misfire by a gifted director.] (S. Granger)