Please note that only capsule reviews are authorized for this title until its theatrical release.
Much of the buzz about Lenny Abrahamson's emotionally charged, oft-harrowing and gut-wrenching psychological thriller Room is about Brie Larson's Oscar-calibre performance — and it's all deserved. Larson's portrayal of a young woman held captive in a garden shed with the 5-year-old offspring (Jacob Tremblay) of said captor for nearly a decade is astonishingly layered and grounded (her vacillation between a stronghold and a mercurial depressive is commendable).
It's also a thoroughly immersive work that careens seamlessly from anxiety-inducing terror to touching drama to intimate observation, and has a firm grasp on the nature of childhood psychology and trauma, which is something most stories of this nature simply avoid.
(Elevation Pictures)Much of the buzz about Lenny Abrahamson's emotionally charged, oft-harrowing and gut-wrenching psychological thriller Room is about Brie Larson's Oscar-calibre performance — and it's all deserved. Larson's portrayal of a young woman held captive in a garden shed with the 5-year-old offspring (Jacob Tremblay) of said captor for nearly a decade is astonishingly layered and grounded (her vacillation between a stronghold and a mercurial depressive is commendable).
It's also a thoroughly immersive work that careens seamlessly from anxiety-inducing terror to touching drama to intimate observation, and has a firm grasp on the nature of childhood psychology and trauma, which is something most stories of this nature simply avoid.