Off the Map (2003)

Depression is one of the least understood, least sympathetic, and least cinematic maladies known to modern man, which makes actor-turned-director Campbell Scott’s rendering of a father and husband emerging from the bleak hour of his psyche and returning to the sunlight of his family in Off the Map (2003) all the more amazing. Set in the vast and barren beauty of the New Mexico desert and recounted through the memories of a young woman reminiscing about a strange season in her eleventh year, this sensitive, searing, and at times hilarious depiction of oddballs hanging onto their sanity while living in a weird place celebrates the ups and downs of the human experience, no matter what condition your condition is in.