‘Midnight’ an electrifying mystery – ‘Blind Brother’ a refreshing romantic comedy

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This image released by Warner Bros Entertainment shows Adam Driver (left), and Paul Sparks in a scene from ‘Midnight Special’. (AP)
This image released by Warner Bros Entertainment shows Adam Driver (left), and Paul Sparks in a scene from ‘Midnight Special’. (AP)

‘Midnight Special’ is one of those rare, stimulating creations that grabs you and penetrates your bloodstream from start to finish. This unique tale about a kid with special powers skillfully melds mood and story, giving the entire experience the feel of a thrilling getaway chase — one that you’re part of, too. Director Jeff Nichols dares you to get in, shut up and come along for the late night drive down some desolate Southern roads where the headlights are optional and the mission is life or death.

As with his riveting 2011 breakout “Take Shelter,” Nichols doesn’t reveal details carelessly. It forces you to pay attention and give yourself to his vision.

Take the first scene. We hear about a child’s abduction on a television broadcast. Then we discover that we’re with two men (Michael Shannon as Roy and Joel Edgerton as Lucas) in a motel room. They’re paranoid about something. Then we see a white bedsheet draped over the outline of what appears to be a child, and you realize you’re with the abductors. It’s an unsettling milieu.

But then Roy removes the bedsheet to reveal a child (Jaeden Lieberher) who is neither scared nor upset. He’s calm. He’s wearing noise cancelling headphones and pool goggles and there’s even ordinariness about it. You realize that Roy isn’t evil at all — there’s an undeniable tenderness in his empathetic, haunted eyes, and it just makes you want to know more.

The boy’s name is Alton and he is, to put it too simply, exceptional. He has powers that no one understands, but that inspire obsession, devotion and fear from those around him. Roy is his father.

He’s taken his son away from a religious cult led by Sam Shepard’s Calvin Meyer, whose service that night is interrupted by federal investigators who have also become interested in the kid. A skeptical, curious NSA agent (Adam Driver) shows up too.

The cult has been using Alton as their prophet. He goes into a trance and speaks in tongues and they take it for scripture. What is most compelling to the government, the leaders, and even his father, though, is a date and location that keeps coming up. Friday, March 6. No one knows what will happen then, not even Alton, but they’ve seen enough to know that it’s not worth questioning. But the kooks, the simpletons, the bureaucrats, the scientists, the law, and the devoted parents alike all know that they must go.

Destroy

To explain too much about Alton’s powers would be to destroy the shock of the revelations and the ingenuity with which they’re executed. But “Midnight Special” peels the layers of the story away elegantly and confidently.

But the climax doesn’t match the wonder and tension of the journey and the grace of the aftermath. For some, that might make everything before it crumble.

But there is so much more here than that moment. There’s the desperate pursuit of spiritual fulfillment. There’s the blind trust of the awe inspiring but incomprehensible. There’s the simplicity of a parent’s unquestioning trust of their child — and the ever-present fear and knowledge that there will come a day when that child does not need you anymore.

What’s missing is someone who says “wait, what?” when everyone else says “yes.” But all the actors are all so strong that they carry that burden well, especially the criminally underrated Kirsten Dunst, who comes in midway in a part best left to discovery, and Shannon in his third outing with Nichols.

While Shannon excels in pretty much all of what he does, Nichols seems able to look past his height, stature, and penetrating eyes and find the aching sensitivity beneath a sturdy man who might crumble at any moment. Alton might be the exceptional one in this world, but in the movie, that title belongs to Shannon.

“Midnight Special” a Warner Bros release, is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association of America for “some violence and action.” Running time: 111 minutes. Three and a half stars out of four.

After living for more than a decade within the Apatovian slacker-comedy tradition, in which the joys of arrested development are smiled upon indulgently for a while before our heroes stride heroically and inevitably into maturity, it’s weirdly refreshing to see a romantic comedy where selfishness, resentment and sloth are presented as unabashed virtues. Such is the charm of Sophie Goodhart’s “My Blind Brother”, which takes an ostensibly dark premise — a man of few qualities attempts to steal his overachieving blind brother’s girlfriend — and turns it into a featherweight frolic as winningly unambitious as its central couple played by Nick Kroll and Jenny Slate. The film has “Netflix acquisition” written all over it.

Inspirational

Square-jawed and iron-willed, Robbie (Adam Scott) is a fully inspirational man. In spite of his blindness, he manages to excel at almost everything a sighted person could do, whether it’s running marathons, skiing or even driving a car short distances. A local small-town celebrity who stages various feats of strength to raise money for charity, Robbie has appeared on television six times in the last four years, as he’s all too willing to let you know. His brother, the resolutely unaccomplished Bill (Kroll), lives for his sibling, faithfully guiding him and running just behind every step of the way, huffing and puffing while Robbie strides along with ease. His supporting role in life seems fair enough, as he doesn’t seem to have much else going on.

The catch here is that Robbie is a smug, intolerable narcissist, while Bill is sympathetic in his sad-sack haplessness. He can’t even drink his sorrows away without screwing up: Fleeing his parents’ nightly liturgy of Robbie worship at home one night, he runs straight into a funeral wake at his favorite bar. Outside, however, he meets the ex-girlfriend of the deceased, Rose (Slate), whose attempt to break up with her boyfriend caused him to walk into the path of a bus. Each recognizing a fellow traveler on the road to nowhere, the two flirt by fantasizing about watching TV and sharing competing feats of self-worthlessness, and eventually wind up in bed — the rare two-way pity lay. Rose declines to share her number the morning after, however, and Bill sinks even further into depression.

It gets worse. Looking to assuage her guilt, Rose volunteers to work with the blind, and becomes Robbie’s guide for his latest venture — a long-distance ocean swim — quickly and almost accidentally becoming his girlfriend as well. Bill becomes their unhappy third wheel soon enough, and the rest of the film flies by somewhat predictably, with plenty of low-key screwball set pieces and awkward revelations as Bill makes one losing attempt after another to one-up his infuriatingly competent brother.

Belatedly expanding on her 2003 short of the same name, Goodhart never looks to reinvent the wheel here, and the film seems content with a drily functional visual palette. What sells it, however, is the writer-director’s ability to merge rudeness and sweetness without ever stumbling into cruelty or sentimentality. There are plenty of gags at the expense of the blind, but none ever cross into meanness, and the film allows Rose and Bill to slowly develop into happier people without ever forcing them to face anything so bourgeois as actual self-improvement. (Agencies)

None of this would work without a rock-solid cast, and Slate stands out in particular. A comedienne so utterly lacking in self-consciousness that she sometimes seems unaware she’s on camera, Slate can take something as simple as putting her panties on backward and turn it into a inexplicably uproarious bit of physical comedy. Scott plays slick smarm as well as anyone, and his refusal to allow himself to become the butt of any jokes only serves to make them even funnier. Zoe Kazan nails her limited scenes as Rose’s feckless roommate, while Charlie Hewson is good for some chuckles as Bill’s blind stoner buddy. Kroll is so droll he almost risks underplaying his utterly passive character, but his easy chemistry with Slate is always enough to carry the film. (Agencies)

By Lindsey Bahr

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