Review of This Must Be the Place (2011) by Caleb C — 28 Feb 2012

I had mixed emotions watching this movie throughout. There we're times I hated it, and had no clue why the hell it was made the way it was at moments. By the near end, I came to appreciate it quite a bit. Sean Penn is brilliant here, and I can see a lot of audiences either embracing his weirdness here, or totally writing him off as a dull overplayed sterotypical character here. His tone of voice almost never changes, and he really encompasses the whole "gothic" role quite well. His honesty is sometimes hilarious in a dark way, but it works well with this character.

The rest of the characters in the film react the way most would to a character like this in real life. I wish I could have seen more scenes where there was interactions with the leads family, but this also wasn't the focus of the story. Everyone Penn's character encounters has their own memorable thing about them.

The film is quite genuine, it just isn't firmly grounded all the way through. Personally, this was one of my favorite films that will come out this year at some point, and I do realize that it is no where near a perfect film. Either way, I couldn't help but love it all in the end. This is one I will want to watch it again soon.