At some point we all took a vote and decided Nick Offerman was our go-to Heartland of America man. I’m not sure why that was on the ballot, since it seems like a pretty minor issue politically, but I did vote for him.
The point is, Nick Offerman’s everyman aura, his Midwestern drawl, and his fascinating ability to be intense and laidback in one scowling breath have served him well. He can poke gentle fun at smalltown Indiana in “Parks and Rec” and look perfectly at home as a U.S. Army General in “Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning.” He can even host a lovable, cozy gameshow about woodworking. Every single time the audience thinks, “Yeah, that tracks.”
Offerman’s versatility gets pushed to new levels in the true crime drama “Sovereign,” a sobering and frightening American tragedy based on a real police shooting. The film stars Offerman as Jerry Kane, a conspiracy theorist who makes a living hosting seminars. He teaches that money isn’t real and all contracts are a lie. That means you, yes you, never have to pay your mortgage, and no law technically applies to you. So anyone who tries to collect on your debts or hold you accountable — for damn near anything — is a fascist.
Jerry drags his teenage son to these speaking tours. Joe Kane (Jacob Tremblay) has been told his whole life to be an independent thinker, but if he expresses any interest in going to school and interacting with kids his own age, Jerry basically says, “No, not like that.”
Tremblay has a tricky part to play in “Sovereign.” Joe’s rational brain is kicking in, but his programming keeps fighting back. No matter how harmful his father’s mental state is, Jerry clearly loves his son, so any pushback will feel like a betrayal.
The young actor navigates this inner conflict with fugue-like weariness. It’s easy, from the comfort of a comfy chair, to solve Joe’s problems. But he can’t just leave his dad. He’s not psychologically or pragmatically equipped to extricate himself from this situation on his own. Eventually he’ll have to choose: either reject his father and his troubling teachings, or go all in to protect that only family he’s got, however he can.
Writer/director Christian Swegal hinges this whole film on an early meeting between the Kanes and John Bouchart (Dennis Quaid), an Arkansas Chief of Police who represents everything Jerry hates, even though they have one thing in common — they’re both domineering fathers. Swegal seems to argue that no matter what politics or mental health issues are involved, there’s an incontrovertible masculine authority problem at the core of American strife. This gives “Sovereign” a depressingly universal quality, since if you don’t know what that’s like you can at least get the gist of it. Everyone runs into an overbearing, condescending man who wields too much power eventually.
“Sovereign” paints the Midwest as an empty place, but only for conspiracy theorists. Bouchart and the Kanes’ neighbors seem relatively happy. Certainly they’re more social. Jerry only seems comfortable with people who share his delusions. Everyone else is an ignoramus or a threat. His identity is built around his ego, the notion that he understands the world better than everybody. But the foundation for his personality is, ironically, helplessness. His power stems from his martyrdom. He won’t even pay his bills when he has the money to do so. For Jerry, ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, and to suffer them unnecessarily.
“Sovereign,” again, is based on true events behind a deadly police shooting. The movie begins there, then flashes back, making those deaths appear inevitable. But it’s a steady sink into self-imposed victimhood that leads to all that violence. We’re watching the Kanes drown in slow-motion. Swegal’s film isn’t about a traffic stop turned deadly, it’s about everything that had to go wrong first. “Sovereign” is at its best when it follows the trail, stopping briefly to ponder each fork in the road, revealing paths not taken. They could have led somewhere safer. Kinder. Somewhere sane.
Nick Offerman’s performance makes this journey fascinating. Jerry is set in his ways, he knows where he’s going, but Offerman reveals in tiny moments how much happier he’d be outside his self-imposed cage. There’s a lie to the smile he aims at his son and to his followers. And at himself. But he can’t hide from the audience. We get to know him, and no matter what we think of his worldview, we kind of understand. He’s an injured animal. He needs help, but he’s still dangerous. By the time we got to him he was too far gone. “Sovereign” is some of Offerman’s most complex and disturbing work. It’s a fine film, too.
“Sovereign” is now playing in theaters and available to rent on VOD.