TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

Baseshment I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Justina The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Tomas Maly Similar to movies like Babel or 21 Grams, this movie is based around a tragic event, and the characters surrounding it. The connectedness among the characters is something that is revealed slowly, though I will say it becomes apparent enough about 30 minutes in how Charlize Theron and Jennifer Lawrence are connected, primarily through a third (Mexican) character. You see several Mexican men (and boys), but watch for the guy with the big nose, and you'll start to piece it together. It's not until about the half way point that you start to realize how the Mexican girl plays into the whole thing. I got the impression that the movie had a certain sad and depressing ending, but I felt like the tragedy/sadness was more of the climax than the ending. You see Charlize Theron's character behaving throughout the movie with a certain sense of self-loathing and thankfully the end of the movie shows the beginnings of change in her character for the better. There is in fact two tragedies in this movie, and it's not until about 3/4 of the way through that you start to understand why the second one happened. Which is related to the first one, the burning trailer. I feel that Kim Bassinger as a cheating mother and Jennifer Lawrence as the aware and yet bitter daughter, was a dynamic that both played very well. Faced with self-shame and loneliness, a mother of four finds romance in another man and as the story goes on, you start to see her carefulness slipping, as the daughter (Jennifer Lawrence) learns of the situation. She begins to express a certain coldness and yet self- inflicted pain/mutilation that is the product of learning to hate her own mother.In the end, we are presented with the moral that we always have a choice to live with shame or live with love. The film has a certain sensation of epicness, in the sense of showing the human extremes of love, tragedy, hope, reconciliation, hatred, shock, etc, but I'm glad it ends on somewhat of a semi- positive note.The only real gripe I have is the sudden ending that leaves the viewer on a certain emotional string. We are left with a certain feeling of hope, but the scene cuts out just as Charlize Theron's character decides to make a different choice (of not running away) - rather than showing what actually happens next because of that choice. The ending would have felt less ambiguous (though somewhat hopeful) and more uplifting. It could have lasted one more scene, with hugs and smiles and what not, and still kept the depth of humanness in the whole story, without being too cheezy.

Tim Kidner What lies beneath our external persona and how we carry our past is an often an untapped, intriguing and even dangerous place to explore - and to return to.So, as we see Charlize Theron, extremely unglamorous as she rises from yet another bed at another man's house, in Portland, Oregon, an air of sadness drifts over us. Yet, as debut director Guillermo Arriaga grapples with his own script - and he has written some corkers - Babel & 21 Grams - we are strangely hooked.We want to see this woman and her life and how it connects with the rest of the film. As guarded restaurateur, Sylvia (Theron) we see that she's preoccupied and soon, she meets up with a figure from the past. From here - and inter-cut with the present, we visit her past life and how childhood events have shaped her. I won't reveal too much about this, except Kim Bassinger plays her mother, who has a torrid affair with Hispanic farmer Nick (Joaquim de Almeida - whom many will recognise but not be able to name!) near their New Mexico home.This is typical independent cinema; often slow, raw and intense and generally, as attractive as real life is - not very. Acting is always compelling and almost uncomfortably real but just because a film ticks all the 'pure' boxes, it doesn't necessarily make for a good film, which needs to be entertaining AND interesting. The latter, generally, yes, the former, not often and somehow the length and story don't make for a film that's totally satisfying. The good cinematography helps, though, as does the sparse and atmospheric music.Many will find the general pessimism of the film a little overbearing and this isn't Arriaga's best script; apparently the movie didn't do well at the box office and maybe the director will go on to produce a better film or write more great scripts for someone else to direct.

banzanbon Great cast! Everyone gives a zillion percent and there is some exceptional choice casting too, though the actors weren't used to their potential and their roles even came across as superfluous; but okay, I was just happy to see those specific actors.Some of the characters are too much a caricature, especially the character played by Charlize Theron. She's such a cliché, I'm afraid to say. There's something 'prodigal' about Sylvia/Mariana, both as an adult and as a teenage girl.The story builds nicely though slow; sometimes it's too slow and drags for no apparent reason. The problem is that there are bits and pieces of the storyline that are also left dangling. They tie up nicely on the one hand but then, you are left feeling that they will continue to be tools for the future insight of the characters but then they're not. So those arcs were like dangling participles in the narrative, as far as I was concerned.This film though, as I mention in my tag line is a perfect example of how flashbacks (and dream sequences) are often a VERY tricky business in a film and if they're not properly shuffled into the sequences, it can make the film disjointed and cluttered. This film has those moments but because of all the rest of the things it has going for it (landscape, good actors and a partly interesting premise) it makes you want to give it a chance and wait out the fog to get to the cliffhanger.

MBunge This is a quiet, leisurely film about the tragedies that unite and divide two families over three generations in the American Southwest. It's the sort of deeply serious drama where the audience is told more through the actors' expressions and tone than through any bit of dialog. That also means The Burning Plain is the sort of movie that bores many people to tears. I am usually one of those viewers left weary and fatigued but not this time. Partly that's due to some non-liner storytelling that avoids pretension and trying too hard to be clever. Mostly it's because Charlize Theron gets buck naked.Yes, I realize that's a fairly crude and crass reaction. It also happens to be true for me and, I would guess, it would also be true for other folks who normally can't stand this kind of tale. The beautiful Miss Theron is completely nude at the very beginning and then gets topless before the film is halfway over. The nudity being non-gratuitous, actually showing us something important about Theron's character each time, certainly elevates the experience. Regardless, if she hadn't taken it off, I probably would have spent most of this movie annoyed and waiting for it to end. By so immediately grabbing my attention and then doing it again, I was pulled into this very human conflict more effectively than a billion fancy words or a rainbow of histrionic performances every could. The whole point of telling a story is to engage the audience and it's not always necessary, wise or even appropriate to do that exclusively at the highest level.It also helps that none of the characters in The Burning Plain are annoying or aggressively foisted on the viewer. Mostly in silence and sometimes in action, they're allowed to unspool on the screen with each scene taking you further and further into who and what they are. But it's mostly Theron taking her clothes off.This motion picture jumps back and forth among three different time periods and three sets of characters. There's Gina (Kim Basinger), a desperately unhappy woman who slinks away from her husband and children to the arms of Nick (Joaquim De Almeida), a similarly adulterous husband and father who is consumed with unconditional passion for her. Things move ahead in time a bit to Gina's daughter Marianna (Jennifer Lawrence) and Nick's son Santiago (JD Pardo), who find their souls intertwined after violent death shatters both of their families. Many years after that, there's Sylvia (Charlize Theron), an emotionally wounded woman who self-medicates with joyless promiscuity and Maria (Tessa Ia), a young Mexican girl who sees her cropduster father crash in front of her eyes and is taken on a journey to find the mother she's never known.Now, if you pay any attention at all, you'll quickly figure out how all these people fit together, where their lives are going and how they'll get there. Fortunately, experiencing the voyage is more important that arriving at the destination. The Burning Plain isn't about watching a plot unfold. It's about recognizing other human beings in moments of pain, joy, selfishness, nobility and fear. You hope these people get a happy ending the way you want one for yourself.In addition to baring it all, and once again demonstrating the principle of Producer Self-Nudity, Theron is marvelous as a profoundly sad woman who deadens herself with sex and almost can't stand it when she must acknowledge her own feelings. Kim Basinger is equally wonderful as an equally sad woman who finds not anesthesia but liberation in her affair. Jennifer Lawrence and JD Pardo are also captivating as two teenagers whose unprocessed anger propels them forward when they don't have any idea what they're doing.The Burning Plain isn't for those who want something quick and loud and distracting. If you're looking to ruminate for a while, this isn't a bad object to focus on. And that's not a reference to Theron's bosom.