Midnight Special

For F*** Magazine

MIDNIGHT SPECIAL 

Director : Jeff Nichols
Cast : Michael Shannon, Joel Edgerton, Kirsten Dunst, Adam Driver, Sam Shepard, Jaeden Lieberher
Genre : Sci-Fi/Drama
Run Time : 112 mins
Opens : 21 April 2016
Rating : PG (Some Violence)

As kids, many of our parents would’ve told us were special. We either believed it but stopped as we got older, or never believed it in the first place. Well, Alton (Lieberher) is a genuinely special kid, gifted with superhuman abilities and revered by a religious cult in Texas led by preacher Calvin Meyer (Shepard). Alton’s father Roy Tomlin (Shannon), alongside Roy’s childhood friend Lucas (Edgerton), escapes from the cult and Roy is accused of kidnapping Alton. Alton’s mother Sarah (Dunst) has been expelled from the cult and has not seen her son in two years. The family are reunited but far from safe as government agents and enforcers from the cult alike pursue Alton. In the meantime, NSA analyst Paul Sevier (Driver) discovers that Alton possesses classified government knowledge that would ordinarily be impossible to acquire, and attempts to determine where Alton derives his powers from. 

Midnight Special is a sci-fi drama that has been described as being redolent of Amblin Entertainment films of yore, movies like E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. While the plot elements superficially come off as X-Files-esque – a creepy cult, an unearthly child, government agents on the kid’s tail – writer-director Jeff Nichols is aiming for anything but a conventional thriller. Midnight Special is very much a slow burn and what initially starts off as an intriguingly ominous mystery drops off into a generally uninteresting road trip before building back up to a mind-bending conclusion. The film’s juxtaposition of the fantastical and the mundane, set mostly in rural American locales, reminded this reviewer of Looper, which also featured a child with incredible powers. There are also shades of many a superhero tale, and Alton is seen reading issues of Superman and Teen Titans.

Nichols wrote the film as a meditation on becoming a father. When he was coming up with the story for Midnight Special, Nichols’ then-8-month-old son had a febrile seizure; this was a sobering moment that struck Nichols and his wife. Indeed, the bond between parent and child is Midnight Special’s driving emotional force; Nichols taking great care in avoiding full-on schmaltziness. There’s a detachedness to Midnight Special that works both for and against it; in steering clear of the cheesiness of its influences, the film also sacrifices a degree of warmth. The moments of spectacle are judicious and the special and visual effects serve the story well (apart from a few shots of phony-looking helicopters). There’s an intimacy but also a tacit sense of scale surrounding the story, with the National Guard scurrying about as afore-mentioned helicopters buzz overhead.

This is Shannon’s fourth collaboration with Nichols, and the director clearly brings out something in him we don’t see very often. Shannon is one of those actors who generally projects menace even when he’s not playing a villainous role, so to see him as a steadfast, protective Papa Wolf and to see him excel at it is one of the best things Midnight Special has going for it. Dunst brings a shattered, haunted quality to Sarah – physically, she is free from the control of the cult, but its tendrils are still wrapped around her mind as she makes up for the two years she should’ve spent with her son that were taken from her. Edgerton’s Lucas is the muscle; his connection to Roy and Sarah not made readily apparent. The character’s primary function in the plot is to argue with Roy over the proper way to guard over Alton.

Lieberher may not be one of those child actors whose performance is so transcendent as to leave everyone gushing over it, but he tackles the challenge of making Alton seem strange without going full-tilt creepy. It can be seen as a metaphor for caring for a child who is on the Autism spectrum or who has other developmental disorders – these children often feel they do not belong in the world, and their parents must construct a bespoke world for them. Driver is exceedingly likeable as the stock nerdy character amongst all the G-men and military types who sees something nobody else does. He apparently received the news that he was cast in Star Wars during his first day on the set of Midnight Special.

One man’s fascinating is another’s frustrating – this is very true of Midnight Special. Nichols draws the viewer in with what promises to be one corker of a mystery, only to lose us in the middle, before pulling us back in for a spectacular finale which, while not a cop-out per se, still leaves a great many questions unanswered. Ambiguity can be used either with intent or as a cheat and the ending is far from satisfactory. Midnight Special will be the starting point for many a post-movie family conversation; it’s far from light and fluffy but is ostensibly a family film at the end of the day. It might result in more head-scratching than self-reflective pondering, though.

Summary: Midnight Special’s pacing issues and difficulties in delivering a satisfying conclusion do not entirely nullify its introspective approach to the sci-fi drama genre, with Michael Shannon in particular delivering a heart-rending performance.

RATING: 3.5 out of 5 Stars

Jedd Jong 

Upside Down

For F*** Magazine

UPSIDE DOWN

Director:	Juan Diego Solanas
Cast:	Jim Sturgess, Kirsten Dunst, Timothy Spall
Genre:	Drama, Romance
Run Time:	100 mins
Opens:	14 February 2013
Rating:	PG

“Did you think that your feet had been bound/ by what gravity brings to the ground?” So go the lyrics to Peter Gabriel’s “Down to Earth”, from WALL-E. Just as that film was a high-concept science fiction romance, so is Upside Down.

Well, sort of.

This French-Canadian film stars Jim Sturgess as Adam, who lives on a planet much like Earth, except that it has “dual gravity” – two worlds are separated from each other, the prosperous realm of “Up Above” casting its shadow, quite literally, on the lower-class citizens of “Down Below”. Adam is from Down, and a forbidden love between him and Eden (Dunst) from Up blossoms, as they meet for secret rendezvouses between the mountains of both worlds. Following an accident, Adam believes Eden to be dead, but catches a glimpse of her on TV, and so he gets himself employed by Trans World, the mega corporation that provides the only link between the two worlds, so he can chase the girl of his dreams.

Stories about star-crossed lovers are nothing new. From the Chinese myth of the Weaver and the Cowherd to Romeo and Juliet, from Jack and Rose to Anakin and Padme, we’ve long been fascinated by the idea of two people who must cross incredible boundaries to be together. Upside Down’s premise seems ingenious and very creative at first – how about have the force of gravity separate our male and female leads? However, it turns out that there is nothing more to it than that.

There is very little character development, and we learn next to nothing about Adam and Eden throughout the film. If their love transcends the force of gravity, then why is it so thoroughly uninteresting? The symbolism is heavy-handed (the leads are called “Adam” and “Eden”), and this is yet another poor-boy-falls-love-with-rich-girl tale, a formula which the filmmakers add precious little to. Though cosmic forces are keeping the two apart, it doesn’t seem like there’s much at stake. The film struggles to stay in line with its internal logic regarding the way the “dual gravity” works, and inconsistencies mar what seems like a clever idea, eventually exposing its inherent flaws that writer-director Solanas was probably unaware of as he was crafting the story.

Jim Sturgess and Kirsten Dunst and both talented actors, but saddled with an exposition-heavy opening narration that outlines the rules that govern this strange planet, Sturgess’s voice strains with mock wonderment. Kirsten Dunst seems rather detached from her role, though she does get to reprise some of the upside-down kissing she made famous in Spider-Man. Both have somewhat stilted line delivery that is certainly not helped by the clumsy dialogue. The only other character of note is Timothy Spall’s Bob, Adam’s colleague at Trans World who helps him find Eden – but it’s a comic role Spall can do in his sleep.

It would be a sin to completely write off Upside Down though, because credit is due to Solanas and his team for at least daring to try something different, and something so technically difficult to film. This is a very visual-effects heavy movie, what with the two opposing worlds and their respective gravities, and despite the Hollywood leads, it’s essentially a foreign film and not a big studio production, and it looks all the more impressive with that taken into consideration. It’s a stylish picture for sure, and many shots look straight out of a Chris Van Allsburg-esque picture book.

Unfortunately, this is one of those movies that is fascinating visually, but only on that level. There’s probably a compelling love story to be found somewhere in Upside Down, but it is left completely unmined, and audiences will have to make do with a simplistic and aimless plot, and a romance that never captivates. One can suspend disbelief – but what goes up must come down, and this movie does so with a clatter.

SUMMARY: Beautiful visual effects and art direction can’t stop this half-baked sci-fi fantasy romance from falling apart (and up, and down).

RATING: 2 out 5 STARS

Jedd Jong