Midway through the year, there started to be murmurs about Ryan Gosling giving an Oscar-caliber performance in a small indie film called “Half Nelson,” about an eighth grade history teacher who’s also a crack addict.

I hope Gosling, writer/director Ryan Fleck and everyone else involved with the film will forgive me for pishawing the film simply for its premise. Unless it’s the kids that drove him to drugs (as a former eighth grade teacher, I will vouch for the likely possibility), I didn’t really care to see it. Well, turns out Gosling made the Oscar cut. He’s one of the five lucky actors in the running for the statue.

For once, the hype is deserved. I just peeled myself off the couch, where Gosling and his young co-star Shareeka Epps kept me mesmerized for the hour and 40-minute film. Gosling plays Dan Dunne, a leftist, inner-city history teacher trying to reach his students through the politics of revolution and anarchy. He’s also a basketball coach, a womanizer and a crack addict. During the course of the film, he spirals out of control in the drug’s grip and struggles to hold onto friends, family and his passion for politics.

Along the way, we are introduced to Drey (Sharkeeka Epps), the 12-year-old daughter of a single mother whose older brother is in jail for dealing. When she stumbles upon her teacher and coach smoking crack in the lockerroom, an odd, counter-intuitive and co-dependent friendship develops.

I’m a sucker for understated performances. Truth is in the eyes of an actor, and grandiose, over-the-top charicatures often serve to hide that. Gosling nails every nuance of “Dan Dunne,” in the lifting of his brow and the furtive glances and widening of his eyes - from an addict’s fear and paranoia, to joy, to helplessness. He first made waves in another implausible role: As a Jewish, neo-Nazi in “The Believer.” Six years later, he brings that character’s adolescent frustration to fruition. He’s utterly unselfconscious and never manipulates the audience into feeling sorry for him. I know in my heart that Forest Whitaker will get the trophy, and if he doesn’t, Peter O’Toole should get it simply because this is that legend’s last chance. But I can’t imagine seeing a finer performance by an actor last year, and I’ll be surprised if I see a better one this year.
Epps is even more remarkable - you just have to see her. The girl’s 14 but quietly outdoes everyone with only a handful of lines. She’s all body language, and acts with a lifetime’s worth of soul. When she and Gosling share the screen, they make it hard to turn away.

The movie’s subject matter is uncomfortable, but never grating or exploitive. More compelling is the undercurrent of politics behind it all. What does it mean that the modern revolutionary thinker, idealist and teacher also smokes crack in the girls’ lockerroom? Who is teaching whom and who has most to learn?I can’t say it enough: Cue it up on your Netflix, run to your Blockbuster or just buy a copy at Target. “Half Nelson” will have you thinking long after the credits roll.

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