Retired farmer and widower Alvin Straight learns one day that his distant brother Lyle has suffered a stroke and may not recover. Alvin is determined to make things right with Lyle while he still can, but his brother lives in Wisconsin, while Alvin is stuck in Iowa with no car and no driver's license. He then has the idea of making the trip on his old lawnmower, thus beginning a picturesque and at times deeply spiritual odyssey.
Acting
Richard Farnsworth's final, devastatingly authentic performance
Cinematography
Freddie Francis turns Iowa highways into cathedral light
Direction
Lynch restraining his surrealism finds deeper strangeness in the ordinary
Director
David Lynch
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