What a beautiful film.

Couldn't agree more. It's a shame it got such a limited release.

Look, I'm just gonna go home and kill myself. You wanna share a cab?

Wow!!! I loved it. It is Michael Douglas at his best..

Well until people's mindset are toward hero-movies like Iron Man and Fantastic 4, there is no room for others to shine.

Agreed, I really liked this film, the music, storyline & acting is all great and Evan Rachel Wood is looking pretty hot in this. 7/10

Couldn't agree more. Really loved it. I had a bad feeling at first that it was going to jump a little too far into the "quirky-quaint-and-oh-so-clever" box, but it never did. When you see a film like this, one that doesn't depend on harshness, violence, bright flashing objects, or insult humor, it's almost a shock--just full of real gentleness and humanity, and much more than meets the eye. Exactly what a "little movie" is supposed to be, AFAIC. Some of the success depended heavily on the actors, too. Hard to imagine the characters being done any better, including not only the dad & daughter but Pepper too, the creepoid Costco manager and wife (underplayed, actually--think about how much worse those roles would've been if they'd been played like broad comedy), etc.

Also, if this were the only film you ever saw E.R. Wood in, you'd think she was the best young actress in Hollywood--and actually, maybe she is. I don't know how you could be better at portraying a combination of being older than your years, quiet dignity, puzzlement, and love for your father while being not quite sure whether he's a crazy person. It was one of those roles so appealing that it makes you wonder if the kid really is like that.

Also: The other thing I really love about this film is that it's in that class of stories that seem impossibly odd until you realize that things like this actually do happen in the real world, more frequently than most people think. Check the "news of the weird" on the Internet any day and you can imagine the way the news account would read:

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Santa Clarita (AP) -- A local 16-year-old girl was questioned and then released after her mentally disabled father forced her to help him break into a local Costco and then tied her to a vending machine.

Charles McCann, 57, who had been released only last month from ABC Treatment Center, is presumed to have drowned after jackhammering into an underground waterway for reasons not yet clear to police.

An accomplice was arrested after a low-speed chase. Police first arrested Pepper Johnson, 61, for loitering and suspicious behavior, then heard a voice coming from a walkie-talkie hidden inside the man's jacket. Johnson also faces a possession charge from two marijuana cigarettes found in his pocket.

The girl, whose name has not been released in accordance with state policy regarding juveniles, was uninjured. She will not face charges.

Searchers plan to call off the search for McCann by Thursday, if his body is not found by then.


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I guarantee you I'll find you five stories a day weirder than that one.

If you've ever seen films like The Coca-Cola Kid (Aussie films used to do this better than almost anybody else did), you've seen this kind of thing before: In summary, the situation seems almost impossible, but when you go through the story one step at a time it seems much more plausible. It just isn't all that hard to imagine a guy who filled his inside-the-walls time with figuring out where a big stack of gold might be located, and then going straight to it as soon as he's released, using whatever means he has at his disposal, with his teenage daughter both skeptical and semi-involved.

(In CCK, it was an American Coca-Cola employee, a specialist in conquering marketing territory for Coke, who finds himself out in a valley in the bush, trying to figure out how to put the clamps on the local small-factory soft-drink manufacturer who happens to be the reason that in that one very small area, Coke is not #1. And friends, Coke cannot be anything but #1. It just isn't so implausible to think that this wouldn't annoy the living sh$% out of them, like a pebble in the shoe--they dominate the entire continent except for this one spot, and they MUST WIN THAT ONE SPOT. If you haven't seen it, give it a try and just accept some of the mid-'80s datedness. It's a lot of fun, and AFAIC it was Eric Roberts' funniest role ever as the obsessed ex-military man who is going to win that territory for his employer--while an employee at the hotel where he's staying thinks he has Roberts ID'd as a CIA agent, digs up a briefcase full of cash for an arms deal he swears must be in the works, etc.)

Of course, one thing I did NOT see in the film was an explanation of how Miranda could have been taken into custody, questioned, and released without anybody figuring out her true age and finding out that no agency or foster family actually was taking care of her or was responsible for her. Maybe somebody else has this figured out, but it looks to me like a big glaring flaw.

Some may disagree with me on this, but I think two themes from MD's past films actually add to the story, rather than take away from it. "We're looking for buried treasure!" ('Romancing the Stone', 'Jewel of the Nile'), and "Something's not right with Dad, but he loves his children" ('Fatal Attraction', 'Falling Down', 'War of the Roses'). It doesn't seem to interfere with climax of the film, where MD's character realizes all that he has done to find the treasure was to show his love for his daughter. Rare to see that, I've seen too many films that make a mess of this, and degenerate into nostalgia, or sentimentality that is sugary-sweet. Good Movie.

Yup. I discovered this gem late. I love it so much. I agree with everything you said.

Also, usually, I would still have one or two things to whine about, even in a film I love. But there's absolutely nothing in this film that bugged me.