Nocturnal Animals

Starring: Amy Adams, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michael Shannon, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Isla Fisher, Ellie Bamber, Armie Hammer, Laura Linney, Andrea Riseborough, Michael Sheen, Karl Glusman
Directed by: Tom Ford
Rating: R
Genre: Drama, Thriller
2016

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: An art gallery owner (Amy Adams) receives a copy of her ex-husband's (Jake Gyllenhaal) novel as her own marriage strains under pressure.

Review:

Tim: Nocturnal Animals is a difficult movie to watch. There's uncomfortable sequences, to be sure, but the whole movie just has this dark, edgy vibe to it. Director Tom Ford tells the story with abandon, making you feel like anything could happen to anyone. You immediately sense that the film won't have a happy ending, that there's nothing "feel good" about anything you're watching on screen. I appreciated Ford's willingness to go to dark places, even though it made the movie a bit difficult to watch at times. In the end, I appreciated the effort enough- I'd consider this a solid movie, although I know it was designed to be more than that. This is the kind of film expected to be nominated for several Oscars and certainly it hoped to win some (it ended up with just one nomination).

The story is an interesting one. Amy Adams plays the main character, an art gallery owner whose current marriage is unhappy and crumbling as she receives an advance copy of her ex-husband's novel. Much of the movie is a visual depiction of the novel itself, which is where the violent, most difficult to watch scenes happen. It's kind of a fascinating way to tell the story- the scenes that take place within the "real world" of the movie are slow, dark, and depressing. The real emotion comes from the visual depiction of the story in the novel Adams is reading. It's not the most typical approach to storytelling, but the whole movie benefits as a result. Still, this film felt bleak for long stretches of it.

The cast is quite strong. Amy Adams continues to prove she's an exceptional actress. She gives a great performance here- it's restrained, but you can feel the underlying emotion of her performance. I enjoyed her in this film. Jake Gyllenhaal is really good, too- I love that he continues to play roles like this. He gets to showcase his talent and get several truly emotional sequences. He's quietly becoming one of the best actors in Hollywood today- and this is yet another impressive performance he gives. Michael Shannon continually proves he's one of the best supporting actors working today. He received the film's only Academy Award nomination (for Best Supporting Actor). He uses every single minute of his screen time to maximum effect. I loved his interactions with Gyllenhaal. Shannon really gives a great performance here, although it's never in-your-face. Aaron Taylor-Johnson was good in a smaller role, as was Isla Fisher, Armie Hammer, and Michael Sheen. The cast as a whole is quite good, although Adams and Gyllenhaal take up the vast majority of the screen time.

Now, while there's a lot of strengths here, this is far from a great movie. The movie is dense, bleak, and often quite slow. The scenes of the novel are far better than the scenes taking place in the real world, which gives the film a disjointed view. The movie feels a little long at 1 hour, 56 minutes. This is the kind of film that shoots for many Academy Award nominations, but ended up with only 1, and it didn't really have much of a shot of winning that one.

While this film is flawed, the thing that really convinced me it was good was the connection between the events of the novel's story and the characters outside of the novel. This is by far the best part of the entire film. It takes some actual thinking to connect the dots to discover the true meaning of the novel's events, but once you do, you can see why this film is strong.

Nocturnal Animals was flawed and not nearly as good of a movie as it thought it was, but it's still a solid sophomore effort from director Tom Ford. I certainly wouldn't recommend this movie to everyone, but if you like dark thrillers, it's worth seeing this one.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 7



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