Review of Short Term 12 (2013) by Isadore H — 20 Oct 2016

Short Term 12 focuses on a government foster home somewhere in the southern US, it tells a story about several characters problems and how their past has magnified these issues they have, and ultimately overcoming their faults and developing into better people through each other.

I absolutely LOVED this film, I'm usually an action movie guy, mostly out of fear of being bored to death, but I will dip my toes into other material. Everything about this film is perfect. The plot is so interesting and grabs you tightly especially in its third act.

The actors and actresses were all fantastic, I knew Brie Larson and John Gallagher Jr were going to be fantastic here, it's what I've come to expect. The huge surprise was the actor who played Marcus.

Holy. Shit. He absolutely blew me away and was such an interesting character who I really wanted to know more about. The guy didn't talk much and every time the actor made his dialogue somehow the ones I wanted to hear the most.

The dialogue was amazing, I really was hanging onto every word said because it all seemed so real and yet otherworldly. The plot was incredibly interesting and it gave a ton of surprises that really worked for me.

It gave an array of very intriguing characters that I wanted to know more and more about no mater how much was revealed about them. The ending was extremely satisfying and gave a real sense of everything being alright despite the recent turmoil these people went through.

I know it will never happen, but I really want to see something showing these characters a few years or months later, especially the Marcus character, I don't know where I'd rank it in all time performances I've ever seen, but it's definitely a favorite of mine especially since it would've been so easy to make the guy just an angry little shit that would've got annoying after a while, but Keith Stanfield really gave Marcus something extra.

Short Term 12 is by far one of the best films I have ever seen, and I would HIGHLY recommend it to everyone.