I miss this movie beause I really want to watch ROOM and I need to remind my self how mazing Brie Larson is. Real heroes do not always end up with glory and parades. Heroism is sometimes reflected in small scale actions that no one ever hears about but occur every day in schools, hospitals, or wherever there are people who need compassion. Werner Erhard defines true heroism as "the kind which ends up in the truth, in what works, in what is honest and real being brought out and made available to others." This kind of authenticity is front and center in Destin Cretton's Short Term 12, the story of troubled teens living in a short-term group home who are the recipients of empathy from counselors only a few years older who may have faced similar situations in their life.
Winner of the audience award at the L.A. Film Festival and South by Southwest as well as the narrative feature prize, it is funny and sad with a wide range of emotions in-between. Coming from the director's own experience of working in a similar environment for two years, the film is permeated with an air of authenticity and it is rare that a film has such uniformly natural performances.
Grace is one of the young counselors at Short Term 12, a foster care facility for at risk teenagers. Along with Mason (John Gallagher Jr.), with whom she's in a relationship, they look after these kids who have come from a troubled past. The film opens with Mason welcoming a new counselor named Nate (Rami Malek), and he shares a story with him about his first day which didn't go too great. Then they introduce some of the kids to him: there's Marcus (Keith Stanfield) who's about to turn 18 and therefor will be leaving the facility soon, Sammy (Alex Calloway) who's going through a deep psychological trauma, and Luis (Kevin Hernandez) who's easygoing but enjoys bullying Marcus. A few days later a new teenage girl named Jayden (Kaitlyn Dever) arrives at the foster care center who seems to be deeply scarred. Grace begins to connect with her and realizes they have come from a similar past. Grace and Mason are both excellent counselors, mostly because they have come from a troubled past themselves, and despite helping these kids they also have to deal with their own scars in life if they want their relationship to work.
Brie Larson is just terrific in this. Perhaps her best performance yet. Larson is destined to become a force worth reckoning with thanks to her portrayal in Short Term 12. Larson's heartwarming yet weary depiction of a rehabilitated character really brings home Mason's description of Grace, where "weird and beauty come together". Grace's willingness to abandon all physical beauty as well as her joy to share deep emotional and mental insight to her children is never compromised. Larson is revelatory as a person raising a helpful hand to a small minority of the American population that is generally outcasted and ignored.
The supporting performances are also fantastic, characters that although may follow a convention feel like they're coming from a genuine place. It's not often that a film like this would start its story with a relatively optimistic relationship as that dials down the potential for conflict, but John Gallagher Jr. and his chemistry with Larson makes it one we love watching and dread that moment where it inevitably goes wrong. Keith Stanfield is a standout from the younger crowd of actors whose powerful tenderness constantly gave me chills and Kaitlyn Denver who navigates around cliché and provides an earnest and passionate performance. Short Term 12 knows its deck has familiar cards, but it plays them just right. It's nice to have a film that knows that an original perspective is more engaging than original content. Despite its flaws, it's a really great emotional film and definitely the type of film I'd love to make.
"Short Term 12" is a simple, no frills film that focuses on the emotions and pain of people who are vulnerable. From sick children requiring medication daily, to unloved teenagers, to abused youngsters. There is a lot of pain in the film, and these pain are told in an open and authentic manner. I am impressed by the staff's unconditional love towards the teenagers, providing them with a 'normal life' when they do not know what a 'normal life' is. It speaks to the heart
Go see this movie. It has a beautiful story with real characters that you forget for a moment that you're watching a movie and hold your breath during every moment. I give a lot of credit to the filmmakers behind this masterpiece simply because they kept a perfect pace throughout the film and consistently left me, a frequent film-goer, surprised. It had a beautiful score but it was never used to convey the mood in scenes. The filmmakers just showed what happened but left it up the audience to interpret moments which is great for any film to do that because it's not telling us how to think, but letting us think for ourselves. Every character was flawed and real, even the minor characters were given a chance to shine.
8/10 IMDb
99% Rotten Tomatoes
3.5/4 Roger Ebert
9/10 - VERDICT
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