Review: Short Term 12
Saturday, August 24, 2013 at 9:00PM An abridged version of this review was previously published in my column at Towleroad
The movies that hit us hardest can be the toughest to talk about. Sometimes that's because they're personal, striking you right where you live. Sometimes it's more intangible than that, showing you something you needed to see about a less familiar world just to the side of your own, while never forgetting to move and entertain you. Short Term 12 will surely be one of those movies for many, either way.
This rich drama from the Hawaiian filmmaker Destin Cretton, is based on his short film of the same name and concerns a very private young woman named Grace (Brie Larson) the supervisor at a Foster Care facility. Grace is an expert at navigating the emotional chaos of the kids she watches over but less adept at meeting her own emotional needs or opening up to her friends and co-workers about her own secrets. She's got at least two of them weighing her down. Short Term 12 refers to the setting, a temporary shelter for troubled or abandoned kids as they await their next foster home assignment.
I have no personal experience with the foster care system or abusive birth parents or mentoring kids -- Hell, I was never even a babysitter (Youngest Child Escape Clause) -- but within minutes the foreignness of it all slips away. [more...]
What remains is a highly specific world that's always relatably human. Everything feels bracingly authentic from the messy communal spaces, to the cramped offices and empty dorm rooms with cherished mementos from frequently uprooted lives occasionally spotted clinging pathetically to otherwise blank walls. Crucially, the ensemble acting is equally convincing. Brie Larson anchors the movie with a completely organic portrait of both internal damage and innate empathy but this is the rare movie in which even the smallest of roles feels vibrantly connected to the same beating communal heart.
It's an old narrative trick to use a newbie to any unfamiliar world as the audience surrogate which is what happens here. Short Term 12's new employee Nate (Rami Malek) fills that role as he learns the ropes from Mason (John Gallagher Jr) who is secretly dating Grace. But when Nate memorably slips up in an early scene, condescendingly referring to the young wary eyes staring up at him as "underprivileged kids", the role transcends its cliched purpose, and sticks a finger in your own eye if you've been feeling even the least bit proud or superior about your own liberal outreach in caring about these castoffs (or by extension tiny indie movies). The screenplay performs a similar trick with bookend scenes about a rambunctious redhead kid who loves toy animals and who's always trying to escape the building. The scenes are baldly obvious in their structural purpose but no less moving for it, and thrilling in their wild-child abandon.
Rami Malek and John Gallagher cool down Kaitlyn Dever's fit
At every point in its multi-character narrative Short Term 12 seems to be walking on a highwire without a net over huge twin pits of cheap sentiment or needlessly brutal emotional nihilism (these are abused children we're focusing on, and the film doesn't pretend otherwise). But the movie miraculously never falls from its daring perch. if anything it races back and forth across the tightrope, on bike, bus or foot, all while juggling short cathartic bits of character comedy, a open wounded heart, bureaucratic rage, and on a more basic movie level the triumph and discovery of coming of age or into one's own. I cried my eyes out at least twice but by the end I'd reach a kind of clear-eyed movie nirvana and left the screening exhilarated. I hereby vow to stop using the phrase "miniature gem" in connection to great films that just happen to be crafted on a smaller scale than what Hollywood has conditioned us to think of when we think of the movies. A gem is a gem is a gem. To Hollywood size matters but how do you measure a film's insights into human nature or the size of a movie's heart?
I gush. I'm about to break into "Seasons of Love" here. Help me! I feel the missionary zeal with this movie. I'm wearing multiple hats (film critic ☑ movie fan ☑ loudmouth blogger ☑ ) to push this movie. Maybe you saw my tweeted variations on the theme of "Go See This Movie."
#1 Emphatic Recommendation Short Term 12 is [insert any poster blurb here]. I promise you'll love it!
#2 Awards-Niche Targeting Brie Larson deserves to be in the Best Actress conversation
#3 Crazy-Eyed Threat: Don't make me find you, buy your ticket, and personally drive you to see Short Term 12 because… I will!
#4 Guilt-Trip: if you pass on great movies like Short Term 12 in the theater, movie culture will be reduced to one endless loop of "who will play Batman next?" and nobody needs that!
But in the end, the best reason to see Short Term 12 is not that it makes the most of what little it's got, or that its leading lady proves again that she's one of the most gifted of her generation, or even that we need more movies like it since the cinema has abdicated storytelling about the nonfamous and superpowerless to television. Forget all that.
The best reason to see it is as simple as the first: it's legitimately wonderful. You'll love it.
Short Term 12 (2013) is the best SXSW discovery since Weekend (2011) - they both won Best Narrative Feature there.
Grade: A
MVP: Brie Larson but the teen actors are unusually strong: Kaitlyn Dever, Keith Staffield and Alex Calloway all have difficult intense scenes to play and do so with no kid actor affectation. If SAG ever voted on actual ensemble acting other than "large starry cast!" they'd be up for Best Ensemble
Oscar Chances: Yes, it's a steep uphill climb for tiny indies without "prestige" packaging, but quality ought to count for something. While it deserves to be in discussed in multiple categories, let's focus on Best Actress & Best Screenplay since the film could conceivably win some kind of traction in those areas. The screenplay, based on the director's own short film of the same name. In ye olden times the origins of the script would automatically qualify it as Adapted but all bets are off the past ten years as to what means what with the writer's branch. They're getting as weird with their category definitions as the acting branch is with the definition of "Supporting" so who knows.
Reader Comments (12)
Oh man Keith Stanfield as Marcus. What a performance. That poem/riff/monologue he delivers. Stuck in my mind and won't go away. AMAZING.
murtada -- i know. I was such a mess during that scene.
That scene with Marcus was probably my favorite of the year... until we got to the octopus scene. That scene is the perfect example of how something that would seem so contrived in a lesser film comes off as completely naturalistic and infinitely important to the film and its message.
Thanks for the recommendation and frequent reminders, Nathaniel. There are always two or three indies a year that I hear good things about but never get around to seeing (thinking of Smashed from last year). Thanks for helping to make this one avoid that list.
Just saw it based on your recommendation and have the biggest movie buzz I can remember in a long time.
I just gushed on a separate thread, thanking you for recommending this movie. But I forgot to ask this question:
"...that its leading lady proves again that she's one of the most gifted of her generation..."
Can you or someone explain this? I don't know her from anything else (that I can tell) and from her IMDB page I'm not sure where this reputation comes from. Was it United States of Tara?
Just saw the movie tonight. God that movie is gorgeous. Cried a lot through it.
Finally saw it! Didn't LOVE IT as much as you did, but I really really liked it and Brie and the rest of ensemble were amazing. That octopus scene was breathtaking.
Just watched this movie (I've heard so much about it, and I just NEEDED to as soon as I could find it somewhere). That may very well have been the best movie I saw this year. I was just completely gutted many many times over the course of that movie. Obviously (and I don't need to say this for it to already be clear), Brie Larson was outstanding, as was the rest of the cast. I was just blown away, and I REALLY hope that Brie Larson, or the screenplay, or (in a completely ideal world) the movie as a whole gets SOME recognition from the Oscars (though I am cynical, and thus, doubtful).
"Keeping it real" is a phrase that I love to hate but in this instance this is what Cretton manages to do so expertly. Every glance, every touch feels so authentic you can't help but be moved by such fragile yet courageous performances. Your review perfectly captures the intentions of the director and it is films like Short Term 12 (of which there are very few) which remind me why I love the cinema.
Thank you thank you thank you for continuing to bring awareness to this film. I finally saw it last night. WOW. I would have never heard of it had it not been for you. So worthy of attention.
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