X
- 2022
- R
- Momentum Pictures
- 1 h 32 m
- 2022
- R
- Momentum Pictures
- 1 h 32 m
Summary Emily, an elementary school teacher, organizes an inaugural club meeting of like-minded women. When they all decide to move the meeting to Emily’s house to keep the wine flowing, they stop at the local store to pick up refreshments. At the store, an altercation breaks out between a woman from Emily’s past and the group, leading to a vola...
Directed By: Beth de Araújo
Written By: Beth de Araújo
- 2022
- R
- Momentum Pictures
- 1 h 32 m
- 2022
- R
- Momentum Pictures
- 1 h 32 m
Soft & Quiet
82
6.3
Where to Watch
Summary Emily, an elementary school teacher, organizes an inaugural club meeting of like-minded women. When they all decide to move the meeting to Emily’s house to keep the wine flowing, they stop at the local store to pick up refreshments. At the store, an altercation breaks out between a woman from Emily’s past and the group, leading to a vola...
Directed By: Beth de Araújo
Written By: Beth de Araújo
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Universal Acclaim
Based on 14 Critic Reviews
82
86% Positive
12 Reviews
12 Reviews
14% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Universal Acclaim
Based on 14 Critic Reviews
82
86% Positive
12 Reviews
12 Reviews
14% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Soft and Quiet begins as subtly as its title implies. It sneaks up on you. By the time you realize what it’s actually about, it’s too late and you are swept into a narrative (and a world) that you do not want to be a part of.
One of the most audacious American debuts of the year, writer-director Beth de Araújo’s Soft & Quiet shocks one’s system from its opening moments and doesn’t ever slow down to let you fully process it as it happens.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 31 User Ratings
6.3
61% Positive
19 Ratings
19 Ratings
23% Mixed
7 Ratings
7 Ratings
16% Negative
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 31 User Ratings
6.3
61% Positive
19 Ratings
19 Ratings
23% Mixed
7 Ratings
7 Ratings
16% Negative
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
This movie is very, very confronting and disturbing and doesn’t in any way hold back with the themes it’s tackling. This movie will make you mad, sad, frustrated and ultimately leaves a taste in your mouth that’s difficult to wash out, and that’s exactly the point. It commentates on a massively prevalent issue within modern society and does so with no camera cuts or any room to breathe, adding to the masterfully crafted tension this movie provides. It is certainly a very well made movie, and it’s so effectively disturbing that I’m confident I’ll never watch it again
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This was very much worth the watch. Tight story with a realistic look at how insanely easy it is for small groups of people to transition from hateful conversations to actual violence. The acting was amazing, especially in the single-take form. I've been thinking about this film for days after I saw it.
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Soft and Quiet is the most unsettling real-life horror movie since Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer. The seemingly uninterrupted single take with a handheld camera fits the production perfectly.
In depicting the rapid escalation from closeted bigotry to outright hate crime, Soft & Quiet communicates the urgency of identifying and standing up to similarly hateful groups in our own communities, which are never as “secret” as they wish to be.
A tight, minimalist thriller this smart, rhetoric-based turning towards violence and its repercussions, is too good and too important to ignore.
A horror movie that hides its monsters in plain sight, Soft & Quiet is meant to disquiet you from the very beginning, forcing you to ride shotgun with these “jus’ folks” who mix matchmaking suggestions for single members with toxic comments about immigrants and minorities.
The brutal possibilities of the white supremacist mind-set are nothing to shy away from. Still, the film’s admittedly jarring cruelty does little beyond press down on old bruises, turning the realities of racialized violence into an immersive spectacle with the kind of real-world sadistic allure one might find in a serial-killer movie.
I wrote a six paragraph diatribe on my personal misgivings with movies that don't cater to my narrow worldview, lacking the self awareness to realize I was defending racism and **** and presenting them as "conservative values."
Jokes aside, the movie itself is pretty well done, especially if you find the very real hatred of Others to be uncomfortable. The tension is sometimes palpable, and the actors do a good job of selling the whole thing.
I thought the one-shot handheld camera style was kind of a double-edged sword. It kept me laser focused, and it definitely is effective at building tension. However there were times where I wished for some traditional scenes to frame things. I suppose this is a 'me' problem, and is more of a personal preference than a criticism. By the time everything goes off the rails in the third act, the tension was pretty excruciating.
As far as the political messaging, the message of how white supremacy takes many more insidious forms than Klan members burning crosses, is relevant and incisive. As far as I can tell, the movie never veers into "all white people are evil" territory, and I never found myself personally offended (I'm white). But this is a pretty raw look at some difficult subjects and it doesn't pull many punches. I feel like if this movie really triggers you as a white person, then maybe you should try some introspection as to why that is. The issues presented here shouldn't be swept away and forgotten, but engaged with. At the end of the day, many conservatives will probably hate this movie, and many liberals will probably feel sick from it. It isn't the most well-crafted movie, but it is still solid and successful at communicating its points. I hope it can generate some honest, good faith conversation to foster more understanding of the issues it presents. But I'm pretty cynical so... yeah.
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Soft and Quiet review: A Histrionic Lesson in Toxic Femininity and Trite Social Commentary
I find it so disappointing that a film with such drive and passion, which had the potential to be one of the best borderline personality disorder criminal psychopathy home invasion films I've ever seen, had that potential wasted on critical social commentary and cinematic cultural astroturfing.
They should have named the film Gas and Light. I felt like I was watching a caricature of a **** fever dream written by patronizing sanctimonious socialist activists. Like anyone would bake a swastika pie, really next level autistic.
It's ironic the film is called Soft and Quiet because the subtext of the film is saying the quiet part out loud. This is literally a diagram of how the radical left sees anyone who doesn't agree with their DEI agenda. Remember, anybody whom doesn't agree with the radical left are all just a bunch of hate filled psychotic ****.
They make sure to highlight that the one lady is a teacher, meaning you never know who the racist boogieman might be, and they may even be teaching your kindergarten kids. But who are the ones teaching kids gender isn't real and giving them hormone blockers and life altering surgeries and doing drag queen story time?
They dressed up radical socialist woke propaganda as the ever present danger of ethnonationalist fascism lurking around every corner of society. This film made me feel sick for all the wrong reasons. I give this film two swastika pie baking soccer mom's out of five.
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In comedy, if the setup and premise of a joke is false, then the joke doesn't work.
Soft & Quiet doesn't work.
If they film had teeth, like Taxi Driver, it would have been about the real threat in anti-Asian violence. Instead, it took a bunch of unbelievable women and put them in an unbelievable position doing unbelievable actions.
The racial aspects of the movie are false, but the narrative is agreeable in today's society and media. Of course, the film will get good reviews, as the media itself has been pushing the false narrative that we see in the film.
As for the filmmaking itself- first half is well-made and then the second half is completely absurd and mostly 50 minutes of women screaming at each other.
Not as good as the MSM reviews imply.
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This is honestly one of the worst movies I've seen in a while. Nothing happens in the first hr and when things actually happen you will miss the fist hr of the movie where nothing happened. A super stereotypical portrait of racist white people, pointless movie, useless in every way with zero narrative, no moral, no action and nonstop talking. Going back I would have preferred watching my microwave boiling a cup of water for 1 hr and half... BOOOORING
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Awards
Americana Film Fest
• 1 Win & 2 Nominations
Indiana Film Journalists Association, US
• 2 Nominations
SXSW Film Festival
• 1 Nomination
