Review of You Can Count on Me (2000) by Dimitris S — 12 Aug 2008

I really love this film, I think because it's -- pardon the cliche, but so simple, yet so complex; not much happens, yet a lot does, and nothing and everything gets resolved at the end. They never hammer you over the head with themes or explicitly state much of anything, yet you don't have to be super-intuitive to know exactly what they're getting at; it says so much more by not saying anything, by a look, or a gesture, or an instinct because we get to know these characters so well.

(Case in point, the line, "Remember what we used to say to each other all the time when we were kids?" -- a lesser film would answer that question; this film doesn't have to, because the audience knows, and it becomes so much more powerful and poignant because it's left open.

) The casting was excellent, too, but that probably goes without saying.