99 Homes. (Andrew Garfield, Michael Shannon, Laura Dern.)

[Himmel]

99 Homes finds Garfield as Dennis Nash, a construction contractor trying desperately to stay afloat. But when his finances head down the toilet and the bank forecloses on his home, he meets Rick Carver (Michael Shannon), the charming, powerful, greedy, gun-happy real-estate broker who snapped up the place.

Deciding that the only way to provide for his family including son Connor (Noah Lomax) and mother Lynn (Laura Dern), Nash offers to work for Carver, helping him prepare homes for eviction and eventually assist with making families leave. As he worries about the ethics and the danger, he knows that it’s helping his own life.

Premieres in Theaters Sept. 25th.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=sfttvNCIJvE

[DanTheMan]

If you having payment problems, I feel bad for you, son. I've got 99 problems, but a home ain't one.

[Adam_ME]

Saw this one last night. It's a good movie, but really difficult to watch because of the subject matter. The old man with the reverse mortgage being evicted was depressing as hell.

It's basically Wall Street with real estate. Shannon is Gordon Gecko, Garfield is Bud Fox(albeit more sympathetic), and Dern is Carl Fox. The plot follows similar beats all the way up to the ending. It even has a pretty good monologue by Shannon about halfway through that's reminiscent of the "Greed Is Good" speech by Michael Douglas.

The one thing that bugged me the most about the movie though(aside from the ending which is abrupt and has a bizarre and unintentionally funny final shot) was how they completely gloss over the fact that the people being evicted didn't pay their mortgages. Yes, the government and banks did screw over folks leading up to the 2008 crisis, but let's not pretend that a lot of people weren't signing up for loans they had no hope of paying back(unless their house kept appreciating in value).

[Foggy]

Would really love to see this but it's not being shown anywhere near me.

[Adam_ME]

Originally Posted by Foggy

Would really love to see this but it's not being shown anywhere near me.

Yeah, I'm not exactly sure what the plan is for a wide release of this film. I have a feeling it'll wind up being like Me and Earl and the Dying Girl. It gets screened for free for several weeks to build up word-of-mouth, but only ends up playing in a handful of theaters before the eventual Blu-ray release.

[dgoswald]

Glad to see Garfield is moving on from the Spider-man shenanigans.Right Spider-man / Peter Parker, wrong setup at Sony.

He's a very good actor IMO. If anyone hasn't seen his debut performance in Boy A, I heartily recommend it. It's a very tough watch, but he's great in it.

[Hucksta G]

Shannon is so good in this.

[Holmes]

Frequently unemployed tradesman Dennis Nash (Andrew Garfield) has endured a lean period and now faces eviction from the suburban house he shares with his mother (Laura Dern) and son (Noah Lomax). When he runs out of options and the fateful day comes, he finds two policemen at his door. They are led by Richard Carver (Michael Shannon), a cynical and mercenary real-estate agent who has turned the subprime mortgage crisis to his advantage. Dennis and his family move to a seedy hotel crowded with people indefinitely ejected from their homes. In a strange twist of fate, he finds a potential road to financial salvation in the form of Carver, who invites him to join his strong-arm moving team and later embraces him as an acolyte, teaching him to supervise evictions and capitalize on lapsed regulation. This education in ice-cold rapacity forces Dennis to weigh his desire to win (in society's eyes, as well as his family's) against his ailing conscience.

Directed by Ramin Bahrani (a festival-favored neorealist who has slowly polished his craft and moved toward the mainstream), 99 Homes is a highly entertaining film blending a time-tested dramatic motif—the magnetic, volcanic mentor and his hesitant protégé, à la Wall Street and The Devil's Advocate—with a genuine and relevant anger regarding the housing debacle which befell the United States a few years ago and the preceding and ensuing financial gamesmanship. It is a neat fusion, granting the film space and time to indulge a certain didactic urge without sacrificing suspense and personality. It is an economic parable with bite and propulsion, even if a few plot developments and character decisions modestly strain credulity: why, for instance, does Dennis not instantly move his family from their absolute pit of a hotel after he begins earning thousands of dollars? The cast is phenomenal, with the sympathetic Garfield (recently liberated from the downward-trending Spider-Man franchise) emanating authentic desperation while Shannon steals scenes as an antagonist who seduces by pursuing unprincipled aims with swift and vigorous pragmatism. And the existence-upending idea of losing one's home as the system stares on with either ambivalence or a voracious eye proves to be fertile and frightening ground upon which to build a film.

B+

[Kevin Holly]

Shannon is such a boss.

[soarinsteven]

Liked this a lot. Andrew Garfield's best work since The Social Network, and Michael Shannon proving yet again why he's one of my favorite working actors today. Brilliant, convincing, dangerous, conniving.

The handheld camera work, and pulsating score gave the film an urgency this story needs. Worth seeking out.

[LegacyCosts]

This sounds like something I'll be obsessed with. Shannon is magnets for the eyes.

[LegacyCosts]

A poignant reflective tale of America's broken home ownership system. Directed with urgency and immense talent. Michael Shannon is the James Bond of real estate brokers. I was thinking this was a film of the year contender and the last 20 minutes or so happened where character motivations become lost and Garfield becomes silly. Damn. It was so good otherwise. A great but very flawed and frusterating experience. I can only count on one hand the number of actors as awesome as Shannon is.

[amoergosum]

I read that they used a different ending in the version which they showed at Sundance. Does anyone know more about it?

[amoergosum]

I don't understand the logic behind the last 20 minutes of the movie.
>>>

[Show spoiler]Dennis' house was incredibly important to him. So when he got threatened by that guy at the motel, he suddenly sells his house just because he couldn't move in for 2 or 3 weeks!??? That doesn't make any sense at all, does it? The writers suddenly changed his character.
His house meant so much to him, his mother and his son. He could have stayed at another motel for 3 weeks.

I just don't get it. It didn't make any sense at all.

[Buscemi]

As it's probably known, the forthcoming home video release will be DVD-only. I'm not surprised as Broad Green is self-distributing their titles despite not really having the infrastructure (leaving their planned Universal deal) and a bunch of their titles (Samba, Eden, 10,000 Km., Break Point) never even hit home video. I wouldn't be surprised to see them cut a deal with FilmRise for BD-R's of their smaller titles.

Meanwhile, I wasn't a fan of the film. Shannon did well but Garfield is ridiculously miscast, Dern is just kind of there, and much of the rest is a mess. It wants to say something but stands there like a public speaker who lost their cue cards.

[amoergosum]

Interview with Michael Shannon:

DP/30: 99 Homes, Michael Shannon - YouTube

[amoergosum]

Originally Posted by Buscemi

Garfield is ridiculously miscast

I thought it was a strong performance...definitely not miscast in my opinion.

[Kevin Holly]

Originally Posted by Buscemi

Meanwhile, I wasn't a fan of the film. Shannon did well but Garfield is ridiculously miscast

Too bad. I loved the film, Shannon was great, but I agree Garfield was one of the more extreme cases of miscasting of all time. But I felt Shannon was good enough to compensate

[xbs2034]

Originally Posted by Buscemi

As it's probably known, the forthcoming home video release will be DVD-only. I'm not surprised as Broad Green is self-distributing their titles despite not really having the infrastructure (leaving their planned Universal deal) and a bunch of their titles (Samba, Eden, 10,000 Km., Break Point) never even hit home video. I wouldn't be surprised to see them cut a deal with FilmRise for BD-R's of their smaller titles.

Meanwhile, I wasn't a fan of the film. Shannon did well but Garfield is ridiculously miscast, Dern is just kind of there, and much of the rest is a mess. It wants to say something but stands there like a public speaker who lost their cue cards.

Looks like there will be a Blu, but it's Best Buy exclusive http://www.bestbuy.com/site/99-homes...D2NR.4lqHNiUvA

Michael Shannon is getting a lot of Oscar buzz for this (Globe and SAG noms, won LA Critics) so may have to check it out