Take Shelter

Editorial

The female version of ubiquitous Ryan Gosling, Jessica Chastain has come out of nowhere to be 2011’s most prolific actress. Already seen in The Tree Of Life and The Help, Chastain’s welcome support in everyday chiller Take Shelter arrives one month before she plays the younger version of Helen Mirren in The Debt.

Although Chastain is Little Miss Everywhere, Take Shelter is Michael Shannon’s movie. Another memorable performer not shy of appearing in a host of productions back-to-back, Boardwalk Empire mainstay Shannon plays Curtis, a middle-American man who is steadily spooked by visions of oily rain and zombie-ish onslaught. His lovely wife Samantha (Chastain, lovely) fights to stand by her man but, as volatile Curtis quietly fixates upon building an underground haven, he alienates everyone.

Writer-director Jeff Nichols (who previously worked with Shannon on his feature debut, Shotgun Stories) initially harnesses the mundane terror of premonitions – which may actually be the onset of mental illness. But Take Shelter loosens its grip as the ominous landscapes and scary surrealism slot into a groove of prolonged mystery. Despite Shannon’s inherent magnetism, the more Curtis slowly moves towards a storm of sanity, the more his fluctuations and internal conflicts flatten out in terms of absorbing dynamism.

Shannon can do sullen/crazy in his sleep, and domestic disturbances involving he and Chastain greatly assist Nichols’s unusual slant on incidents primarily reserved for straight-up horror films. Undeniably unsettling, without resorting to repugnance or gore, Take Shelter further benefits from a multi-tiered finale which capably upholds what has come before it.

As a certifiably different take on apocalyptic horror, Take Shelter deserves your attention. Shannon and Chastain sustain involvement but the gradual advancement of similar situations and revelations erodes audience engagement.

Hilton Thomas