The Station Agent

Infobox_Film
name = The Station Agent


caption = Film poster
director = Thomas McCarthy
producer = Robert May Mary Jane Skalski Kathryn Tucker (filmmaker)
writer = Thomas McCarthy
starring = Peter Dinklage Patricia Clarkson Bobby Cannavale Michelle Williams Paul Benjamin
music = Stephen Trask
cinematography = Oliver Bokelberg
editing = Tom McArdle
distributor = Miramax Films
released = January 26, 2003 (Sundance premiere) October 3, 2003 (limited)
runtime = 88 min.
language = English
budget = $500,000 (estimated)
imdb_id = 0340377|

"The Station Agent" is a 2003 American independent film about a man who moves to live in an abandoned train station in rural Newfoundland, New Jersey to live a life of solitude. It was written and directed by Thomas McCarthy, who won the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Screenplay.

Plot

Finbar "Fin" McBride (Peter Dinklage) is a handsome 30-ish single guy with achondroplasic dwarfism. The beginning of the film demonstrates the reason why Fin is so withdrawn, as the people around him treat him poorly and he consequently feels increasingly ostracized. He becomes bitter and isolative. He works at a model train hobby shop owned by a similarly silent friend Henry (Paul Benjamin).Henry dies unexpectedly and his will leaves Fin a bit of property with a former railroad station agent's living quarters on it. Fin sets off to find the place by walking down the railroad tracks, as he doesn't drive. He moves into the old building hoping for a life of solitude.

He finds himself reluctantly becoming enmeshed in the lives of his neighbors, especially Olivia (Patricia Clarkson), a forty-year-old artist who has troubles with her broken marriage and is coping with the death of her young son, and eagerly friendly Joe (Bobby Cannavale) a thirty-year-old Cuban American who is working in his dad's snack truck for the summer.

Reactions

Reviews for the film were positive and it grossed more than $5,000,000. The film won awards at several film festivals and several year end awards. [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0340377/awards] Among these were:
*Best Original Screenplay at the BAFTA Awards.
*Best Supporting Actress at the Boston Society of Film Critics Awards.
*Best First Screenplay, the John Cassavetes Award, and the Producers Award at the Independent Spirit Awards.
*Best Screenplay at the Las Vegas Film Critics Society Awards.
*Patricia Clarkson was named Best Supporting Actress by the National Board of Review.
*Audience Award, Special Jury Prize, and Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award at the Sundance Film Festival.

Cast

External links

* [http://www.thestationagent.com/ Official site]
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