Release Year: 2016

Rating: 7.3/10 ( voted)

Critic's Score: /100

Director: Jeff Nichols

Stars: Michael Shannon, Joel Edgerton, Kirsten Dunst

Storyline
A father and son go on the run after the dad learns his child possesses special powers.

Cast:
Michael Shannon - Roy
Joel Edgerton - Lucas
Kirsten Dunst - Sarah
Jaeden Lieberher - Alton
Adam Driver - Sevier
Bill Camp - Doak
Scott Haze - Levi
Sam Shepard - Calvin Meyer
Paul Sparks - Agent Miller
David Jensen - Elden
Sharon Landry - Merrianne (Doak's Wife)
Dana Gourrier - Sharon Davison (Counselor)
Sharon Garrison - Jane Adams (Sarah's Mother)
Allison King - Hannah (Ranch Member)
Sean Bridgers - Fredrick (Ranch Member)

Taglines: He's not like us.

Official Website: Official Facebook | Official site |

Country: USA

Language: English

Release Date: 3 Jan 2016

Filming Locations: New Orleans, Louisiana, USA

Technical Specs

Runtime: 111 min

Trivia:
This will be the eighth collaboration that actors Michael Shannon and Paul Sparks has worked together. Films including Blackbird (2007), The Missing Person (2009), Return (2011), Mud (2012) and Midnight Special (2016). They also appeared in the HBO TV series, Boardwalk Empire (2010-2014), and has appeared in two stage plays; including Lady (2008) and The Killer (2014). See more »

Author:

Rating: 8/10

With Midnight Special, Jeff Nichols enters the pantheon of those nostalgic American filmmakers armed with their lens flares, Pandora's boxes and deeply sentimental reasons, driven by a protective father figure and a maternal relationship to the plot itself.

Lately, Christopher Nolan's Interstellar walked on the same path, and in many ways Midnight Special strangely looks like Interstellar. There's always the same contrast between gigantic and local stakes/issues that can already be found in Spielberg's filmography : on one side, humanity's fate is at stake, supervised by an omnipotent government, and on the other side it is (and perhaps only) a "family affair".

David Wingo's soundtrack is electrifying, the script is intelligent enough for not telling us the whole plot and characters' background in a few lines of dialogue, and despite a half-hearted performance by Michael Shannon, who still shines in its restraint, and some facilities in scriptwriting approaching the end of the film, Midnight Special is so perfectly controlled that it would be difficult to get out of the theater unscathed.

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