94% Take Shelter

It certainly feels like the world is coming to an end these days. Maybe it is, or maybe we're all just getting a little older, a little more aware of the threats that seem to loom all around us. The growing apprehension and helplessness that fills the headlines makes "Take Shelter" feel timely -- here's a movie about an average working-class man who feels like he's losing his grip on reality. He may be right.As long and languid as a summer's day in the Midwest, "Take Shelter" unfolds carefully, delving into the mind of Curtis, whose anxieties have never gotten the best of him. But the signposts of doom are everywhere, especially in the sky. But if it really is raining oil, if birds actually are swarming, if strangers really are after his family, what can he do about it? He can't tell anyone; he's just a normal guy, and he has every reason to doubt himself."Take Shelter" is less concerned about the veracity of what Curtis may or may not be experiencing than with the terror that grips someone who knows that if his paranoia is only that, then he is going insane -- and that would be just as awful a fate as the apocalypse itself.The central, luminous presence of Jessica Chastain is just one way in which "Take Shelter" bears more than a passing resemblance to this summer's "Tree of Life," but if that film seemed to be trying too hard, "Take Shelter" is its polar opposite. There are shots of nature in "Take Shelter" that are even more overwhelming and awe-inspiring than in Terence Malick's film, but importantly there are real people here, too, living in the kind of all-too-real American town where a Lion's Club dinner served on plastic plates is the social highlight of the month.Everyone in the town is oblivious to the change coming at them from all sides, to the calamity that is almost sure to befall them. Only Curtis knows the truth. Or, maybe, they're just really, really bad dreams.This combination of abject certainty and wavering anxiety is brilliantly captured in a towering, Oscar-worthy performance from Michael Shannon -- he may have a slow, uneducated drawl, he may have trouble getting a bank to give him $6,895, but he knows precisely why he needs it: If his visions are right, if there's even a chance they are, he's going to protect his family. And if they aren't, he will need them to shelter him when he loses his mind once and for all. In either case, there's no good way to be prepared.Whether the political undercurrents were intended or not, when the worst possible thing (outside of an end-of-the-world storm) actually does happen to Curtis and he's left on his own to watch his world fall apart, it's hard not to draw parallels to the stories in the news every day. People's lives are ending, at least the ones they knew, and they are helpless to stop the storm from hitting them.It will BE a storm -- there will be NOTHING left. Curtis is so sure of this, he'll even risk looking like a crazy man if it helps other people. A storm is coming. Are you prepared? Curtis is. But then, "Take Shelter" pauses to reflect: What if it isn't?"Take Shelter" is a paranoid political thriller from the 70s, stripped down and relocated to "Main Street." Money doesn't factor into it, because when "it" happens, no one will care about money or banks or who's rich and who's not. We'll just need to survive.Or, maybe it will never happen, and we're all just getting carried away. The storm clouds are always there. Lightning always strikes. You're just looking at it differently."Take Shelter" offers no definitive answers, save the haunting final shot. But it does know that anyone who might be able to sense it, anyone who might have personal proof that the End Days are near, would be laughed off the stage. So, instead, he grows quiet and worries and plans in quiet. Until that day."Take Shelter" demands patience and concentration. Give it that, and it, in return, will do something most films don't even try -- it will get under your skin, make you wonder not only about the next rain, but about whether you're actually ready ... for anything. Affecting and downright hypnotic at times, "Take Shelter" offers a bold look at a man unhinged ... or, perhaps, a world about to be just that.

October 15, 2011

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/take_shelter/

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