Short Term 12 (Destin Daniel Cretton)

[number8]

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/72/Short_Term_12_poster.jpg

IMDB (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2370248/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1)

[number8]

Brie Larson killed it.

I think people getting wrapped in discussing this film in terms of child abuse issues are rather missing the point, honestly. It's so much more a film about parenting than trauma.

[NickGlass]

Brie Larson killed it.

I think people getting wrapped in discussing this film in terms of child abuse issues are rather missing the point, honestly. It's so much more a film about parenting than trauma.

I'm inclined to agree with this.

However, while I found it had the best of intentions--full of nice details and compassion--more often than not, its heart is in the right place even when its head is not. The acting is, on the whole, expressively lived in and the performances (at least Brie and John Gallagher Jr.) strong enough to nearly transcend the writerly contrivances. It's a tricky subject, surely, and I appreciate that the director went for an earnest tone that also included a balance of quotidian humor, even if it doesn't always offset (or need to alleviate) the heaviness of the subject matter. It's a warm film with touching moments, but I wish the way certain characters related to one another felt more organic and less on-the-nose (and that the catharsis didn't have to feel like everyone got their mostly neat happy endings, as the film seemed to fight against easy answers in the first half, especially Marcus--who I thought was a great character until the suicide attempt and the flippant romantic story that was used as the bookend). I think and hope it will find an audience that will really respond to it, but it didn't totally work for me. Oh well.

[number8]

I had the impression that the happy endings are purposefully constructed and there's an unsaid dark lining to them, given how the movie opens with the telling of a funny story that Mason tried to hide the bad outcome of. "I don't like that part." I think it's acknowledging that a lot of these stories don't have a good outcome, but it's nice to focus on the good that they're able to do.

The writing is definitely contrived. The Marcus-Mason relationship is handled better than Grace-Jayden, I think. But speaking of on the nose, that's actually why I think Nate is the most interesting and best developed character in this. I like that his background is really obvious but understated, conveyed with just his choice of words ("I took time of school because I've always wanted to work with underprivileged children"), and that his equally obvious turnaround is not made the big character arc of the story.

[plain]

not a fan at all, reviewed here: http://www.inreviewonline.com/inreview/current_film/Entries/2013/8/27_Short_Term_12_(2013).html

[eternity]

This hits like a baseball bat to a windshield. A fascinating, funny, gutwrenching exploration of the broken saving the broken.

[Mal]

Brie Larson is great but this movie is not.

[Grouchy]

Yeah, I think this is a bad movie disguised as a good one. Larson and the cast in general are great, though.

[Mysterious Dude]

One little thing that seems to be popping up in American movies these days: public domain cartoons. Every time the TV was on, it seemed to be showing one. I noticed a few of them in Ballast and Snow Angels, too. I know it's just a budget thing, but I can't help noticing it.

[Henry Gale]

I guess I should speak up as someone that recently saw it and seemed to admired it more than the posts above would let the consensus look like.

Sure, it's a bit stylistically derivative of many other indie dramas of recent years (or simply just a step away from completely locking into a discernible enough visual feel and atmosphere of its own), and its subject matter and general structure of how it navigates certain arcs might not be revelatory, but it has a deeply heartfelt and well-observed collection of universal moments through the lens of this story, and many moments truly resonated and moved me unexpectedly (and sometimes in unexpected places).

Where a lesser film with lesser people involved may have easily let it slip towards feel inert, but the specificity of the construction of the characters and the performances not only never let it feel false, but become the entire body and completely effective core of the entire picture.

If you remade this word for word, moment for moment, but without these actors, director and all the invisible choices in between, then I'm not sure what's left of it. Luckily, it's all here, and it really clicks.

***½ / 8.6

[Winston*]

I thought this was a good movie. I liked it.

[Watashi]

I loved it. Hit me really hard.

[Pop Trash]

Frustrating, because the first hour is great and often really hit me in the feels. I just wished it stayed on that observational, ensemble, hang-out movie track it was on. At its best, it almost plays like a narrative version of a Wiseman documentary. Call it Group Home.

Alas, Mike D'Angelo is right in the sense it seems to be over-written like a lot of these types of indie movies (cf. Fruitvale Station, though I liked this more). Too much "lets push the stakes, link characters thematically in a really thudding way, and use sexual abuse as a third act revelation as a pat reason for the main character's problems" (cf. The Perks of Being a Wallflower, though in fairness that revelation seems way more 'earned' here than Wallflower which came out of nowhere).

Oh and speaking of revelations: Brie Larson.

[Boner M]

At its best, it almost plays like a narrative version of a Wiseman documentary. Call it Group Home.
Not the first person to bring up the comparison, but it's most similar to Warrendale (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062474/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1) by Wiseman's direct-cinema contemporary Allan King (and suffers in comparison, despite the virtues).

[Pop Trash]

Not the first person to bring up the comparison, but it's most similar to Warrendale (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062474/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1) by Wiseman's direct-cinema contemporary Allan King (and suffers in comparison, despite the virtues).

Huh, interesting. I've never heard of it/him. He even has a Criterion box set.