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Dark Matter

EMAILPRINTFirst Independent Pictures

Dark Matter reviews
49
6.2 User Score:

Mixed or average reviews

Based on 16 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 5 votes
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Movie Info

Genre(s): Drama

Written by: Billy Shebar

Directed by: Chen Shi-Zheng

Release Date:
Theatrical: April 11, 2008

Running Time: 90 minutes, Color

Origin: USA

Summary

RATING: R for a scene of violence, brief sexual content and language

Starring Liu Ye, Meryl Streep, and Aidan Quinn

Liu Xing is a Chinese science student pursuing a PhD in the US in the early 1990s. Driven by ambition yet unable to navigate academic politics, Liu Xing is inexorably pushed to the margins of American life until he loses his way. Liu Xing arrives at a big Western university with plans to study the origins of the universe. In the beginning, everything is looking up. He finds other Chinese students to share a cheap apartment with him, and flirts with an attractive American girl who works in a local tea shop. When the head of the department, Jacob Reiser, welcomes Liu Xing into his select cosmology group, it seems that only hard work stands between him and a bright future in American science. At an orientation for foreigners sponsored by a local church, Joanna Silver, a wealthy patron of the university, notices the earnest student, and an unspoken bond forms between them. Liu Xing becomes Reiser's protege, accompanying him to a prestigious conference where he makes an impressive debut. He is drawn to the study of dark matter, an unseen substance that shapes the universe, but it soon becomes clear that his developing theories threaten the Reiser model. Excited by the possibility of a breakthrough, Liu Xing is deaf to warnings that he must first pay his dues. Soon he is eclipsed within the department by Laurence, a more dutiful Chinese student, and is forced to go behind Reiser's back to publish his discoveries. When his article draws ire instead of accolades, Liu Xing turns to Joanna, who naively encourages him on his collision course. Liu Xing clings to the idea of American science as a free market of ideas, and of American society as wide open to immigrants. But in the end, his dissertation is rejected, and the girl in the tea shop brushes him off. His roommates find jobs, leaving him behind. Too proud to accept help from Joanna and unwilling to return home to his parents, Liu Xing becomes a ghostlike presence at the university. Left alone with his shattered dreams, he explodes in a final act of violence. (First Independent Pictures)

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

75

TV Guide Ken Fox

Hypnotic, culturally pertinent drama.

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75

Chicago Tribune Maureen M. Hart

The film does a fine job of displaying the contrasts between these tense, formalized Chinese students and the faux populist American academics.

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70

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

First-time director Chen Shi-Zheng shows great sensitivity to the pressure and isolation felt by Chinese brains at American universities, and the relationship between Liu and Quinn provides a rare look at the intellectual serfdom of graduate study.

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70

The New York Times Stephen Holden

Dark Matter, with its view of cutthroat politics and competing egos inside a university, is also laudable in its refusal to soft-pedal the viciously petty side of the academic fishbowl.

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60

Film Threat Zack Haddad

This is a great film, to a point. Unfortunately the ending doesn't deliver, making the entire feature an exercise is wasted potential. But maybe that's the point.

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60

New York Daily News Joe Neumaier

Director Chen Shi-Zheng's film has a graceful energy, and three strong performances help make this serene drama - and its shocking conclusion - quietly moving.

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58

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Chen Shi-Zheng, well regarded as an opera and theater director, makes his feature film debut.

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50

Boston Globe Ty Burr

The final act of Dark Matter is grim but unconvincing, and the shortfall leaves an ugly, exploitive taste in your mouth.

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50

New York Post Lou Lumenick

An unsatisfying drama that premiered at Sundance '07 and was supposedly delayed because of the Virginia Tech shootings.

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50

Variety Justin Chang

Never fully succeeds in burrowing under its protagonist's skin, despite conspicuous effort.

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42

Entertainment Weekly Gregory Kirschling

Liu Ye is too inexpressive for his role's demands, and the movie doesn't build to his downfall: It just zaps itself there.

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40

Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir

Dark Matter has neither the technical command of an art-house film nor the manufactured intensity of a grade-B thriller, yet it's also too cheap and dirty to feel like a Hollywood-scale drama.

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40

Austin Chronicle Josh Rosenblatt

It’s hard to ask for juicier, or more timely, subject matter than high-pressure academic ambition turning violent, but to map the descent of a genius into madness isn’t a task to be taken lightly.

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40

Los Angeles Times Mark Olsen

It is easy to see the film as two movies crammed together, neither of them being very good.

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30

Village Voice Nick Pinkerton

First-time filmmaker Shi-Zheng Chen shows little aptitude for accurately transcribing the textures of human interaction; there's not a single credible performance here, not excluding Meryl Streep as a faculty Sinophile, doing that thing where she grinds every line through a gauntlet of tremulous inflections.

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25

San Francisco Chronicle Reyhan Harmanci

If only it weren't based on a true story. It might have been a good movie.

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What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this movie is 6.2 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

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