Like the Tom Cruise classic All The Right Moves, Promised Land is filmed in rural Pennsylvania. Both films deal with an economically depressed area. Unlike the town in All The Right Moves which looks at a really bleak future and Tom Cruise just wants out through football, there's a couple of people who are looking to acquire mineral rights to drill for natural gas. What could be better, oil is what made a lot of people filthy rich in Texas, Oklahoma and places like that.

Matt Damon and Frances McDormand are a pair of sales people from an energy company which is now looking to pay big bucks to various family type farmers who are hit hard with a bad economy and unsaid, but very much an issue are being squeezed by agribusiness companies like Monsanto. Along comes Damon and McDormand with promises of money that will lift debt from all. There is a great scene in a bar where Damon rather saltily expresses just what this money will do for these people.

The issue though is hydrofracking, a controversial process where chemicals are put into the ground to extract gas from the shale rock underneath their farms. But that gas which even on its own occasionally causes damage to water and soil if not extracted safely could have said damage increase exponentially. And it is a gas which unlike oil can't be put in a pipe. We are forever seeking new sources of energy and have to find them somewhere.

But not at the expense of land and environment which is what high school science teacher Hal Holbrook tells his town. Holbrook has the science resume to back up his claims. Later on John Krasinski who co-wrote the screenplay with director Gus Van Sant and who plays an environmentalist activist comes to town. He has a marvelous scene with some grade school kids and shows them the impact quite graphically of what hydrofracking can do.

Later on Damon who is a troubled soul sees just how dirty his employers can play has his own crisis of conscience. At that point Promised Land starts looking like a Frank Capra film for the new century.

Matt Damon is a celebrity who's used his celebrity to promote issues he believes in and there's nothing more he believes in than saving the environment. This is his second time with Gus Van Sant, Damon worked with him in his breakout role of Good Will Hunting. In fact this film probably has more wholesome characters than any that Gus Van Sant has ever directed before. People have their personal issues, but nothing along the lines of My Own Private Idaho, or Drugstore Cowboy, or even Good Will Hunting.

Frances McDormand is far less introspective than Damon, she's about getting the job done and getting back to her family. But she's noticing that Damon is troubled and tries to be a pal. It's a very subtle performance coming from her.

Hyrdrofracking is and does remain controversial. Maybe we can expect some chemical company like DuPont to do a pro-hyrdrofracking piece of entertainment. That is if they can put that over.

In any event Promised Land is a wonderful Capra like film from a most un-Capra like director in Gus Van Sant.

Steve Butler (Matt Damon) is an energy company point man trying to sign up the town folks for natural gas drilling. Dustin Noble (John Krasinski) comes to town to rally the town against the gas company. It also stars Frances McDormand.

Matt Damon and John Krasinski joined together to write this and got Gus Van Sant to direct it. The sleazy sales tactics is too off-putting. It's hard to keep watching people getting taken advantage of. The twist seems wrong. The logic of it seems uncertain. It's just awkward to see. Also the movie gets hokey with its heavy-handed speeches. It's all unnecessary.

This is a soft hitting environmental film. Steve Butler (Matt Damon) represents Global which wants to buy the gas drilling rights to a town. He is from a farming community, but can't drive a stick shift. He is also ill informed of the dangers of fracking. His partner is Sue (Frances McDormand) a working mom who tries to parent from Skype. In the town of Miller's Falls, they meet resistance from Frank (Hal Holbrook) the local science teacher and an environmental activist (John Krasinski).

Rob (Titus Welliver) who owns Rob's Guns and Groceries is sweet on Sue while flirty school teacher Alice (Rosemarie DeWitt) sparks Matt's love interest. The film uses stock cardboard characters to create a nice feel good tale. There is a twist at the end that wasn't too much of a shock. The farmer's have to decide if they want to sell the rights and risk losing their land to environmental poisoning, or wait and lose the land due to poverty as government subsidies dwindle and market prices fall. It is a gamble either way.

The film is not a documentary. It does inform the viewer what fracking is and why it poses danger, but doesn't drive it home to the point of turn off.

Parental Guide: f-bomb. No sex or nudity.