This movie is based upon a book and a stage play. This movie has only got one small setting: a rundown house in New York City, with broken electricity, cockroaches and extremely noisy neigbours.
And exactly this rundown house is the place where a Thanksgiving dinner is taking place with a family, of whom everybody is crumbling under emotional, financial and health problems.
This doesnt sound attractive to watch. And it definitely is not a cheery Christmas movie. But it is still a decent picture. Here is why:
The good: it's so rewarding and refreshing to see actors concentrating on plain acting. And nothing else. Just that. Long scenes, totally uninterrupted by editing. I see a family get together, who are eating and drinking and talking together. Nothing much happens. But because the acting is top notch, it is still fascinating to watch this family chemistry during a Thanksgiving dinner.
The mood of this movie is (purposely) directed in such a way that I as a viewer get the sense that this place and this family is somehow cursed or haunted in some way. There is a really dark undercurrent. It is definitely NOT horror, but there is an intense depressing, gloomy undercurrent present all the time...which makes for an uncomfortable watch.
Any bad? This is NOT the movie you wanna see at the holidays with your family. Because it's quite depressing, sad and bleak. But it is still definitely worth a watch, although it is probably only suited for the die hard arthouse movie fans, who can stumach a depressing family get together in a cockroach infested house...
