The real mystery here is how writer-director Noah Buschel talked recent supporting Oscar nominees Michael Shannon and Amy Ryan into doing this movie.
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12/18/09
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Missing Person (2009)
60
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Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:20
Fresh:12
Rotten:8
Average Rating:5.6/10
Rated: Not Rated
Genre: Dramas
Theatrical Release:Nov 20, 2009 Limited
Synopsis: Premiering at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival, THE MISSING PERSON is a present-day film noir where there isn’t necessarily a bad guy or good guy but more of an internal fight of good and evil. ... [More]
Starring: Michael Shannon, Amy Ryan, Frank Wood, Linda Emond
Director: Noah Buschel
Reviews for Missing Person
1 - 20 (sorted by date)
Top CriticMichael Shannon adds another stunning performance to his resume with this small-scale neo-noir by writer/director Noah Buschel.
12/07/09
It’s beautiful dread.
12/02/09
Buschel makes striking use of the Mike Hammer/Philip Marlowe tradition to tell a story of disorientation and loss in a post-9/11 world where the Twin Towers can go missing too.
12/02/09
Top CriticIt's a great-looking movie, with an evocative use of music and, in rugged-yet-sensitive Michael Shannon, has an actor whose forceful, focused presence is the film's sturdy linchpin.
12/01/09
Top CriticMichael Shannon is a handsome kook whose turns in Revolutionary Road, Bug and this have earmarked him to be the next Jack Nicholson (or at least the next Christopher Walken)
11/30/09
The Missing Person isn't merely a clever, cool spin on the classic private eye story, but it also works as a private eye story. It showcases a lurching, hunched, quietly lived-in performance by Shannon but offers more than just that performance. ...
11/29/09
Why has The Missing Person persisted in staying with me, even though I started craving The Big Sleep halfway through?
11/24/09
Shannon's complete performance, he moves like The Elephant Man and enunciates like Mickey Rourke, allows Buschel to drift into David Lynch territory without getting drowned in it.
11/22/09
Sluggish, stylized and frequently washed in a bilious green tint, The Missing Person is yet oddly irresistible, its omnipresent anxiety like a musical chord that neither rises nor falls.
11/20/09
Top CriticThe moments that do undeniably work are overshadowed by a general feeling that the film just isn't quite clicking the way it could or should have, amplified by a final act that simply gets away from everyone involved.
11/20/09
“So you make jokes and smoke cigarettes,” a lady in the murk summarizes. Yeah. Isn’t that enough?
11/20/09
Top CriticShannon’s performance takes The Missing Person as far as it goes, but when a real-world tragedy commandeers the story, Buschel’s thin pastiche falls to pieces.
11/19/09
neither the existential 70s crime thriller it wants to be nor the apocalyptic fever dream it could have been
11/19/09
A reasonable approximation of the style, capturing Shannon at his most coolly insular.
11/19/09
Not the most riveting of noir dramas, this film exists mainly to project the talents of Michael Shannon in the role of a drunk private eye.
11/18/09
Though Ryan Samul’s textured cinematography makes the stubble and shadows seem nearly 3-D, the story chokes on a dull twist from Rosow’s past.
11/18/09
All of which is well and artsy, but doesn't diminish the sense, once the mystery has untangled, that the film has been gesturing toward a profundity that isn't there.
11/17/09
Top CriticThe film's second half appears primed to tread some interesting existential territory, but Buschel seems confused about what direction he means to take his material.
11/15/09
A drab, pale-looking affair without a trace of visual style, this cross-country pursuit yarn fights a losing battle to sustain viewer attention via narrative alone, so much does it flounder for lack of imagistic flair.
02/06/09
Top Critic1 - 20 (sorted by date)
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