In addition to the flowery words of praise emanating from numerous critics, The New York Times recently named this one of 2025’s Top 10 films.
That clearly warranted a look-see.
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| Fully aware that the art heist he's planning is far outside his area of expertise, James (Josh O'Connor) carefully considers every possible detail. |
Although I generally respect indie filmmakers who weave compelling stories about recognizably ordinary people — a welcome relief from most of the noisy, soulless blockbusters churned out by major studios these days — writer/director Kelly Reichardt’s ironically titled character study brings new meaning to dull, colorless and tedious.
“Colorless” is particularly apt. Cinematographer Christopher Blauvelt’s washed-out palette must’ve been intentional, but the result merely enhances this film’s drab, lifeless qualities.
There’s a point at which measured stillness approaches meaningless, intolerable immobility, and Reichardt crosses that threshold far too many times.
At the risk of succumbing to the obvious pun, this film is like watching paint dry.
The setting is Framingham, Massachusetts, in 1970. The story begins in a local art museum, where James Mooney (a somnambulant Josh O’Connor), an unemployed carpenter and art school dropout, carefully examines four modernist Arthur Dove paintings hung in one gallery. Museum attendance is sparce; a lone guard sits, head down, sleeping at his post. (Is he supposed to be a joke?)
We eventually get a sense, based on his later comments during a family dinner, that James wants to make something special of his life. How he lands on becoming an art thief is left unexplained. Has he done this before? Who put him up to this particular assignment? Who’s the fence? How did he get to know the dodgy friends who participate in this venture?
Don’t wait for any answers; they never come.
Given the year, it’s conceivable that James, his wife Terri (Alana Haim) and their two adolescent sons — Carl (Sterling Thompson) and Tommy (Jasper Thompson) — could have a house and get by solely on her salary. James apparently has supplemented by sponging off his well-to-do parents; his mother Sarah (Hope Davis) is a soft touch, but his father Bill (Bill Camp) — a circuit court judge — is losing patience with James’ ongoing failure to launch.
So: an art heist, in order to make quick cash. Why not?
Back in the gallery, James studies. And ponders. Walks slowly back and forth. Studies some more. Ponders some more. This is typical of the way O’Connor sleepwalks his character through the entire film.
Although the subsequent daytime heist is mildly clever to a point — switching cars; faces concealed by stockings; James orchestrating events, but remaining unseen, outside the museum — his choice of accomplices leaves much to be desired. One deserts him before the caper even goes down; another turns out to be a dangerous loose cannon who, contrary to the plan, wields a gun.
Things go wrong. Then they go seriously wrong, at which point James realizes that he has blown up his life.
A slow, interminable hour of viewing time has passed, before we get this far.
At this point, the story’s interesting characters — particularly the patient, long-suffering Terri and their two spirited sons — are left behind, as Reichardt’s saga focuses mostly on James. He’s hopelessly ill-equipped for life as a fugitive: no money, no clothes, no plan.
He hides for a bit with Fred (John Magaro), an old college friend, who lives on a farm with his wife Maude (Gaby Hoffman). Their lives — and particularly the rural setting, seemingly apart from society’s chaos — apparently symbolize an existence that James yearns for. (Which is rather ridiculous, since he had that sort of life, before he impulsively screwed it up.)
The somewhat naïve Fred views James with mild excitement, as if he’s a famed 19th century outlaw. Maude, more clear-eyed, recognizes that his presence is dangerous; Hoffman’s subsequent confrontation is one of this film’s rare moments of dramatic heft.
Otherwise, Reichardt’s relentless attention to minute details — particularly during the needlessly protracted sequence when James hides the paintings — merely adds to her film’s sluggish, laborious pacing.
This is even more frustrating, given the fleeting brilliance she shows during James’ lengthy bus ride to Cincinnati. At nighttime, before he falls asleep, he spots a young woman, seated next to her husband or boyfriend. They cradle a baby; he’s dressed in military garb. When James wakes the following morning, the woman and baby are alone, her face a tableau of anguish; her guy is on his way to Vietnam.
Those two, quick, wordless scenes succinctly convey more story, more persuasive depth, than anything else in this film.
Jazz pianist/trumpeter Rob Mazurek’s score initially adds a bit of contemplative spark to the heist, but the progressively percussive riffs — five (!) drummers are credited — soon become quite jarring. Once into the second and third acts, Mazurek’s mournful horn bleats evoke strong echoes of Miles Davis’ improvisational score for 1958’s Ascenseur Pour L’échafaud (Elevator to the Gallows), which is an eyebrow-lift; Reichardt’s film doesn’t have anywhere near the dramatic heft of that Louis Malle classic.
Although Reichardt brings James’ saga to an ironic finale, it feels like she just stopped, rather than reaching anything approaching a satisfying conclusion: quite in keeping with her entire film’s what-the-heck style.
One of last year’s 10 best? Puh-leaze.
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