X
- 2014
- R
- Cinedigm Entertainment Group
- 1 h 52 m
- 2014
- R
- Cinedigm Entertainment Group
- 1 h 52 m
Summary As organic farmer Josh (Jesse Eisenberg), high society dropout Dena (Dakota Fanning) and ex-Marine Harmon (Peter Sarsgaard) plan, carry out and then witness the fallout of an attention-grabbing act of sabotage, they find their own personal limits tested.
Directed By: Kelly Reichardt
Written By: Jonathan Raymond, Kelly Reichardt
- 2014
- R
- Cinedigm Entertainment Group
- 1 h 52 m
- 2014
- R
- Cinedigm Entertainment Group
- 1 h 52 m
Night Moves
75
7.0
Where to Watch
Summary As organic farmer Josh (Jesse Eisenberg), high society dropout Dena (Dakota Fanning) and ex-Marine Harmon (Peter Sarsgaard) plan, carry out and then witness the fallout of an attention-grabbing act of sabotage, they find their own personal limits tested.
Directed By: Kelly Reichardt
Written By: Jonathan Raymond, Kelly Reichardt
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 36 Critic Reviews
75
89% Positive
32 Reviews
32 Reviews
11% Mixed
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 36 Critic Reviews
75
89% Positive
32 Reviews
32 Reviews
11% Mixed
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
It’s a richly engrossing drama, so long as you understand that it’s aiming for the head, not the gut.
No stranger to crafting excessive anticipation, Reichardt has funneled that skill into thriller clothing. However, like all of her output, nothing is as simple as it looks.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 65 User Ratings
7.0
63% Positive
41 Ratings
41 Ratings
26% Mixed
17 Ratings
17 Ratings
11% Negative
7 Ratings
7 Ratings
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 65 User Ratings
7.0
63% Positive
41 Ratings
41 Ratings
26% Mixed
17 Ratings
17 Ratings
11% Negative
7 Ratings
7 Ratings
If you know activists, as I do, these characters are not as flat as some have suggested. The quiet moments in the truck while rehearsing or reflecting on their plan, the lack of dialogue sometimes, seemed very realistic to me after seeing many young idealists convinced they are acting for the greater good and trying to be cool while doing it. I never knew anyone who went as far as murder, but you can see how the unchecked self-righteousness of people isolated from their families and the wider society and in a group-think situation could lead to unintended wrongdoing.
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Night Moves is a film of deliberate, gnawing intensity and focus, built around a Jesse Eisenberg performance that doesn’t give much away, at least not easily.
This is mesmerically assured and tensile film-making, with two complex and plausible performances at its core, and the shin-stinging kick of a Chaucerian moral fable.
Night Moves is a thoughtful, clear-eyed and provocative film that raises thorny questions but doesn't offer easy answers.
Some of the climactic turns seem to follow the kind of narrative rules that this film, and this filmmaker, have otherwise defied.
The story is a shallow-draft bark with flat characters on board: Josh, in particular, is de-energized to the point of entropy. Night Moves suffers from a lack of mystery and a deficit of motion.
Accessible and at the same time not so much, this film requires attention, but not to delve into it with more difficult subjects than one might think, but to understand more easily what happens on screen, the film is not difficult to see, but neither is it the kind of movies that you watch on whim.
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Night Moves is a the very definition of a slow burn thriller. It is not in a hurry to do anything and this both works to its benefit and to its detriment. Allowing it time to really milk tension, paranoia, and this sense of anticipation before the deed is done, Night Moves can often be quite tense. Yet, as a character-driven film, its slow pace only serves to highlight how poorly drawn out its characters are with the film relying on these hollow shells to really carry the film. Unfortunately, they are poorly equipped to perform the job and, as a result, the film often struggles. However, as a look at extremism, the war against pollution, and of the need to try and do something to help, Night Moves is a film about three wholly misguided individuals who opt to blow up a hydroelectric dam to make a statement. What that statement is, who knows. What is clear, however, is that this trio is poorly equipped to handle the ramifications of their actions.
The first half of this film is undoubtedly the stronger half with it depicting the lead up to the bombing of the dam. Pairing together Josh (Jesse Eisenberg), Dena (Dakota Fanning), and Harmon (Peter Sarsgaard), as three extreme environmentalists who plot to blow up a dam, the film's first half shows them getting ready. From buying a boat, fertilizer, and planning an exit strategy, Night Moves is filled with anticipation that is quickly converts to tension once they arrive at the river and at the dam. Refusing to use artificial tension via a score in these moments, director Kelly Reichardt largely relies upon situational tension. We know what they are doing, but nobody else does. As such, innocent small talk with a stranger and a parked car that could see their boat heading towards the dam are seemingly innocuous moments, but Reichardt drags these sequences out. They seem to take an eternity on their own, building anticipation and tension as we wait to see if the person will leave or will become suspicious about the intentions of the main characters. This is where the film's limited character development does not hurt it and its slow pace really helps a ton. By having the camera linger for a prolonged period of time, Reichardt makes us intensely uncomfortable and on the edge of our seats, as we wait to see if anything will happen at all.
It is in the second half where the film begins to struggle. With Harmon disappearing all together with the film opting to focus on how Josh and Dena cope with what they have done, the film just lacks the characters to make it work. Mostly predictable and forgettable in this second half, the film becomes quite dull. It feels too cold and distant with Eisenberg opting for a reserved and mute performance as Josh, refusing to ever show any emotion. This shtick works for his counter-part, Peter Sarsgaard, in many roles but it is an odd charismatic indifference that Sarsgaard presents. Eisenberg is just reserved and is a tough nut to crack. Worse yet, the writing makes no effort to develop his character in any meaningful way beyond him being an outdoorsy kind of guy who likes to grow vegetables and be a typical Oregon hipster. That is about all there is to him. Though he handles the events quite poorly, his response to Dena speaking up a bit is obvious and never really raises any eyebrows. In many ways, he just goes through the motions and tries to pretend as though nothing happened to the dam. Unfortunately, Reichardt takes this characterization to heart and just goes through the motions until the film ends. Contrary to the tense and unpredictable occurrences of the first half where the film litters unpredictable elements around its premise of blowing up the dam, the second half just floats on by and never tries to doll up its predictable climax. It allows the scene to come and go with Reichardt building it up as a huge moment with her camera lingering on Josh the whole time. Yet, we feel nothing. Anybody who has seen a film before knew this was coming and, unfortunately, Night Moves play it up to be some shocking event. Somehow, the dam being blown up - which is mentioned in the IMDB description of the film - is more shocking than how Josh responds to Dena's chatty nature.
After a tense, subtle, and smart first half, Night Moves descends into a pale and drab second half that may add to its themes, but is just too predictable and dull to actually work. Compared to the excellent first half, the second half bears little resemblance and feels like Reichardt quickly running out of road and trying to desperately find more to save the film from falling off a cliff. Unfortunately, when you have nowhere else to go, you have nowhere else to go.
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Not nearly enough material to make a full-length movie out of this. So extremely boring. The message of the movie is fine and the acting and directing is good enough as well, but quite frustrating to get through the whole thing, and I'm usually a big fan of laid-back slow movies.
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Holy cow, the critics are dead wrong on this one. Dakota Fanning is a bomb, even next to Eisenberg and Sarsgaard she is as flat as a board, it's a wonder she didn't bring those two down. The cinematography is redeeming, the shots are very well composed if not a little lacking in interest and prolonged. The plot tries to be full, but doesn't drag itself out of the hipster art-kid theme it sets up in the first act. Not worth watching.
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Production Company
Maybach Film Productions,
RT Features,
Film Science,
DeLeon Productions,
Tipping Point Productions
Release Date May 30, 2014
Duration 1 h 52 m
Rating R
Awards
Valladolid International Film Festival
• 1 Win & 2 Nominations
Deauville Film Festival
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
Venice Film Festival
• 1 Nomination
