Limerculer
A waste of 90 minutes of my life
Borserie
it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.
AutCuddly
Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,
Lucia Ayala
It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.
Amy Adler
In a rougher area of Boston 30 years ago, Jimmy (Sean Penn), Sean (Kevin Bacon) and Dave (Tim Robbins) are playing street hockey when the puck goes down the drain. Now without "game", the trio starts writing their names in wet cement on a public sidewalk. Suddenly, a car pulls up....its the cops! Well, they have a badge anyway. Scaring the kids, Sean points out that he lives across the street. But, Dave, who lives one street over, is ordered to get in the car so they can talk to his parents. Crying, Dave does. However, its soon obvious to the neighbors that Dave has been abducted; he escapes four days later. Now, flashing forward, Dave and Jimmy still live in the neighborhood, with Jimmy owning a corner store and Dave doing odd jobs. Both are married and parents. Jimmy's oldest, Katie (Emmy Rossum) is nineteen and from a previous marriage. With second wife, Annabeth (Laura Linney) he has two other daughters, one who is going to have her first communion the next day. Katie works at the store and is going out on the town with two galpals. Concerned about late hours, Jimmy reminds Katie that its an important day for her sister tomorrow. Yes, Dad. But, the next day, she doesn't come to the store for the early shift and she doesn't make it to the church. Unhappily, she has been murdered and the detective on the case is Sean, who moved to a different part of Boston but is with the BPD. Naturally, Jimmy is distraught and has a gang of goons, his wife's brothers, doing their own detective work while Sean tries to reason with his former friend. There are other secrets, too. Dave, who has never been "normal" after his abduction and molestation, came home the night of Katie's death with blood on his person. Wife Celeste (Marcia Gay Harden) doesn't quite believe his story that he beat up a mugger. Also, Katie, unknown to all, was planning to elope with a man named Brendan Harris, who her father despises. So, what really happened one fateful night and who will pay for the crime or crimes? This fabulous movie is based on an equally fabulous novel by Dennis Lehane. Its Boston setting is seedy and beautiful at the same time and has a ring of authenticity few stories have, as Lehane was born and raised in Boston. Then, too, the actors are superb, with Penn terrifying as the tough guy Jimmy, Robbins touching as the "damaged goods" man, and Bacon rounding out the trio in a quiet, somber performance of power. Harden, Rossum, Linney, Laurence Fishburne, and the rest are great, too.
Sets, costumes, and cinematography are wonderful as well. Add on the amazingly complicated but first-rate tale and Eastwood's terrific direction and what we have, folks, is a ten star, must-see several times movie!
Upasna Sachdeva
One of the most dark and depressing movies and stories ever come across, yet Mystic River is a pleasure to watch and more than that, to think about at laying awake in bed nights after. A summation of brilliant subtle & understated acting, pushed to the limits by the fact that every character had something boiling beneath the surface and an undercurrent of swinging hopefulness yet hopelessness. The key idea that the movie brings out is that there is no redemption. And no escape. It sells the disheartening idea that everything perpetuates through our lives - our griefs, our prejudices, our weaknesses, our flaws and that there is no escaping these. That there are no arcs, despite everything we see we don't really change. There are givers and takers, the weak and strong, the bullies and the bullied. It says that the weak will forever remain the weak, the bullied will remain bullied forever. In fact, it goes on so much as to hint that these "characteristics" of ours will propagate from one generation to another. The weak will attract the weak and the kings will attract the queens. No redemption and no escape. Terrible, depressing idea isn't it. Could makes one want to kill themselves as it did in the movie.In cinema, where most stories show characters developing and changing through their lives, this movie says the opposite - that even over twenty odd years, our basic traits and choices remain the same. Reminds me of that poem in the Synecdoche, New York: "Whoever has no house now, will never have one. Whoever is alone, will stay alone. Will sit, read, write long letters, through the evening. And wander the boulevards, up and down, restlessly. While the dry leaves, are blowing."
MartinHafer
The film begins many years ago and shows three friends, Dave, Jimmy and Sean outside their homes in Boston. Some pedophiles arrive and pretend to be cops and they kidnap and rape Dave...who, fortunately, is able to eventually escape.Years pass and the three men are grown. Jimmy (Sean Penn) is a family man whose youngest is about to take her first communion. However, he and the family don't realize that his oldest has been brutally murdered. When he learns of this, he vows revenge.At about the same time, Dave (Tim Robbins) returns home very late. He's bloody and cut...and his story about attacking a mugger seems contrived. There also is a boyfriend of the dead girl...and he has some 'splaining to do. And, there are a couple detectives who are investigating all this and one of them is Sean (Kevin Bacon). What really did happen? Who really is at fault? And, will the police get to them before Jimmy and his thug friends?"Mystic River" is occasionally tough to watch, as it deals with child sexual abuse, murder and extreme violence. It's also quite grim. Because of this, you should consider all this before watching the film. This being said, it is a very good film and features some amazing acting...so if you're up to it, by all means give the film a look. I appreciate not only the acting but all the false leads and clues...and the viewer will not so easily piece it all together.
Luciano Marzo
Mystic River starts off strong enough. It's dated, but engaging, and benefits from great performances from Tim Robbins and Sean Penn. It contains some high-quality scenes, but as a whole, it's very disappointing, mostly due to the fact that it has one of the worst endings I've ever seen. The ending is so bad, it ruins the entire movie, which is a shame when you consider how much better the movie could have been with just a few key changes (mostly to the third act). Toward the end of the movie, one of the most likable characters is killed off unnecessarily. His murder is deeply dissatisfying, and everything about it, including the aftermath (in other words, the rest of the movie), which the writers also flubbed, feels like it belongs in an inferior draft of a much better screenplay. The ending is not just dissatisfying, it's disgusting. Jimmy's wife, Annabeth, is a repulsive human being, and the final scene with her is nauseating. Mystic River ends on a horrible note. Of the movie's two tragic murders, one is shrugged off, and the other is not only defended by the perpetrator's own wife, but not investigated by a character who is a police officer! (He doesn't arrest the culprit, either, despite the fact that the perp more or less confessed to the crime). And then we're expected to give a sh*t when the police officer's wife decides to come home? Such a reunion seems trivial during the aftermath of the ruthless murder of a major character, whose death, I might add, was not grieved by a single character, and was almost entirely glossed over. But even disregarding the two murders, or at least the more recent one, I had zero emotional investment in the police officer at this point, anyway, and can't imagine other viewers having much more. Come to think of it, I cannot recall a single point in the movie where Kevin Bacon's character did anything that might arouse the slightest bit of sympathy in the audience. Yet, by the end of the movie, more focus is given to this minor subplot to do with his wife and to a random parade than to the overarching plot of the movie! Mystic River had the potential to be an excellent crime drama, but it squanders the talent of its leads to create a movie that is extremely unpleasant, incredibly frustrating, and vastly overrated.