Review: 99 Homes

-
And you thought the people in Up in the Air had tough jobs.

Dennis Nash (Andrew Garfield) is a single father living with his mother (Laura Dern) in their family home. After some bad advice from a banker, and the construction crew he works with going under, Nash finds himself evicted from their home by a seedy real estate broker, Rick Carver. (Michael Shannon) After he's forced to move his family into a dingy motel, he returns to Carver to confront one of the men that that moved his stuff, only for Carver to offer him a job, first on maintenance, then it quickly escalates to kicking other people out of their homes. But he's so hard up for money, he has no choice.

I appreciate the caliber of asshole Michael Shannon is capable of playing. Rick Carver's temper and flat out douche baggery is practically a work of art. So much so that I didn't even hate the guy. I was too impressed. Garfield, who I think is a very strong actor was actually kind of bad compared to Shannon. Though bad for Garfield isn't terrible by any means.

The film could've used a bit more polishing. It felt poorly edited and the ending, while it worked, may have benefited from a different approach. The story is good and it's worth it for the performance of Michael Shannon alone.

Recommended: Yes

Grade: B

Memorable Quote: "I can. I'm a Doppler fucking radar." - Rick Carver (Michael Shannon)

Comments

  1. AnonymousOctober 27, 2015 at 8:00 AM

    I always prefer Shannon when he's not in douche mode. I don't know why, but he does that so much that it almost verges is caricature at times. He has so much talent, but I find he's almost always typecast. Still...this has gotten enough good ink for me to be interested.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 27, 2015 at 11:12 AM

      He's very typecast, which he's even pointed out himself and is trying to get out of, but he plays such a good asshole. lol I love the guy no matter what.

      Delete
  2. m.brownOctober 27, 2015 at 8:10 AM

    I really wanted to see this, as I found the trailer pretty damn compelling. After reading this however, it sounds like it can wait. I mean, that new Vin Diesel movie isn't going to watch itself, right?

    Bullshit aside, I love what you say about Shannon: so good you can't even hate him. That sounds about right. Dude's amazing.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 27, 2015 at 11:11 AM

      LOL Witch Huntaaahhhs!

      I'm to the point where I root for Michael Shannon to go insane. He was so subdued (but still good) in The Harvest. And I was like "Come on man, your wife is crazy...kill her!" That's bad.

      Delete
  3. VanishedfrontierOctober 27, 2015 at 11:18 AM

    "And you thought the people in Up in the Air had tough jobs." - I laughed. When I saw the trailer, it's exactly what crossed my mind. It's on my watchlist, so I must say the poorly edited et need polishing part tells me there is no rush.

    About Michael Shannon, at the beginning of Boardwalk Empire, he told how he was happy to play a good, normal guy and then... he discovered it wasn't really the case ! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 27, 2015 at 2:36 PM

      LOL Yeah, Van Alden stayed super normal for all of two episodes.

      Delete
  4. BirgitOctober 29, 2015 at 11:49 AM

    I have not heard of this film but the premise sounds interesting

    ReplyDelete
  5. JoshNovember 2, 2015 at 6:04 AM

    I have high hopes for this one, especially the performances by Garfield and Shannon. Can't wait to see it!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamNovember 2, 2015 at 1:43 PM

      I hope you like it when you do. Shannon is especially great.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Thanks for stopping by, let's talk movies!
(comments are moderated to reduce spam)

Popular posts from this blog

Random Ramblings: The Radio Flyer Conundrum

-
Image
Recently, I was talking to someone about who I thought were the best child actors when I was also a child.  Two that really stood out to me were Elijah Wood and Joseph Mazello, and one film those two were in together was called Radio Flyer.  Then I was reminded about the uniqueness of this film. Instead of reviewing the film, I wanted to have an open discussion about the ending. It deals with a tough issue; child abuse. What I’ve noticed is the way that the film ends is interpreted many different ways, and the filmmakers never came forward to say what was right and wrong. I’m interested in hearing everyone’s opinions on it. How did you interpret the ending? Obviously spoiler alerts will follow.. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, the basic premise is this: Two young boys, Mikey (Wood) and Bobby (Mazello) move in with their single mother and her boyfriend, who refers to himself as ‘The King’. It doesn’t take long for The King to start physically abusing Bobby, and the
Read more

Indie Gems: Behind The Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon

-
Image
Passionate about your profession? I had never heard of this film until it ended up on one of Jason's favorite horror movie lists around Halloween. It immediately sounded interesting to me, so of course I threw it in my Netflix queue. (and if I'm just now watching it after adding it around Halloween, you know how ridiculous my queue is) Taylor (Angela Goethals) is a journalist who, along with a film crew decides to follow around a serial killer named Leslie Vernon. (Nathan Baesel) He plans on doing the typical slasher thing - getting a bunch of drunk teens in an abandoned house and knocking them off one by one. He gets advice from a retired serial killer, Eugene (Scott Wilson) and is threatened by a man who's on to him, Doc Holloran (Robert Englund) Taylor and crew are there capturing it all. Leslie Vernon is fucking hilarious to start with, and clearly very passionate about what he does. He tells Taylor all of his secrets and can barely contain his excitemen
Read more

Please join me in my Favorite Movie Titles Blogathon!

-
Image
Earlier this week I made a post where I ran through the letters of the alphabet with my favorite movie titles. There were a few people that suggested I turn it into a blogathon, and I've never done that before. So here goes nothing! Since this is my first attempt at a blogathon, it's all pretty simple, and it's hopefully a quick post that everyone can join in. Rules: 1) Going through the alphabet, list your favorite movie title beginning with each letter.  2) You don't have to necessarily  like the movie to use it's title.  3) Use the banner at the top of this post in yours. 4) Please have submissions in by Friday, May 30th*. (But I'll be honest, if you send them to me after that date, I'll still add them to my post.) You can either leave a link to your post in the comments here or tweet it to me, ( @ramblingfilm )  Thanks everyone! :)  *I had to move the date back a week due to Photobucket threatening me with bandwidth issues. But
Read more