Review: Powerful 'North Country' Is Bit Too Forceful

'North Country' (R)(out of four)

Without question, "North Country" is based on an important true story -- in some ways one of the most important legal stories of the 20th century. But that's a fact the film never lets us forget, and it ultimately suffers from overplaying its hand and overwhelming our senses.

Some films inadvertently hit the audience over the head with what they're trying to say. This one bludgeons us until there's no possible way of mistaking what we're supposed to think.

The setting is northern Minnesota, more specifically the rural, dank and dirty mining towns that pepper the state's rural northern frontier. But to understand the power of this story, you must first understand that mines in these towns do not only provide jobs to local residents, but foster their own unique way of life. They spread their influence, both economic and social, to every tavern and family dinner table. They are the lifeblood of this closed society.

When Josey, (Charlize Theron) a single mother looking for work, is hired at a local mine and joins the other women in the pit, she isn't seen as a proactive single woman but as the silly girl who shouldn't be doing man's work. And worse: She's seen as someone who stole a job from one of the town's men.

In such a hostile environment, as one might expect, these women are not exactly welcomed as co-workers. They are the unwelcome intruders in a man's world, verbally, and in some cases physically assaulted at work. All the while, their bosses and neighbors look the other way. After all, they shouldn't be there in the first place.

Even Josey's mother, Alice (Sissy Spacek), takes the side of her father (Richard Jenkins) who also works in the mines and considers Josey an embarrassment.

"North Country" has two chapters, namely despair and revolt, as Josey comes to realize that the only way to overcome this sexism is to fight it head on. She hires Bill (Woody Harrelson), a New York lawyer who has returned home, and files a class-action lawsuit. He takes the case because he knows it will be a first.

Based on Clara Bingham and Laura Leedy's book "Class Action: The Landmark Case That Changed Sexual Harassment Law," there are moments that work in this film, when the agony of a woman deserted by her own family -- even her son when he hears gossip at school -- cuts close to the bone. But far too often, as Josey suffers and fights back, the spirit of this real-life quest is simplified and stripped bare.

It's a film that keeps pushing, over and over again, for that big, emotional moment. And it suffers from a sense of overkill, from a strained sense of self-importance.

Far too often the complexities of the town and its working-class politics are reduced to two factions -- purity and evil -- and "North Country" naively presents the difficult-to-define world of sexual harassment as a clear-cut case of black and white.

Yes, the story of Josey, or Lois Jenson in real life, is a shocking and important one. Her case confronted corporate sexual harassment and scored a major victory for women across the country. It is presented here, though, as a one-dimensional horror story that becomes less affecting the more it focuses on Josey's scars and less on Josey herself.

At some juncture, it feels more exploitive than empathetic, mercilessly chipping away at Josey's dignity and self-respect.

The actors do their best to avoid this fate, bringing a sense of understatement to the melodrama. . Everywhere one turns, things are being downplayed. Theron, as Josey, is a dirty, scared and sobbing mess, undeniably moving as she tries to bravely endure the perpetual injustices.

Spacek, torn between her town, her husband and her daughter, internalizes her anguish. Jenkins, in hindsight, may be the best of the bunch, perfectly capturing that quiet, Midwest tendency of older generations to observe quietly until it is time to speak up.

But sadly, as the film repeatedly cuts to clips of the 1991 Clarence Thomas Supreme Court hearings -- another sexual harassment milestone that director Niki Caro ("Whale Rider") takes liberties in juxtaposing with Josey's story-- "North Country" never becomes the important social document it so clearly strives to be.

The further it reaches for its Oscar, the more it pushes us away.