Ain't Them Bodies Saints2013
Ain't Them Bodies Saints (2013)
TOMATOMETER
AUDIENCE SCORE
Critic Consensus: While conventional in plot, Ain't Them Bodies Saints is a visually poetic film that pays homage to the New Hollywood directors of the 1970s and promises big things from director David Lowery.
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Movie Info
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Cast
as Bob Muldoon
as Ruth Guthrie
as Patrick Wheeler
as Skerritt
as Sylvie Guthrie
as Sylvie Guthrie
as Sweetie
as Cowboy Hat
as Bear
as Sissy
as Freddy
as Will
as Zellner
as T.C.
as Lt. Townes
as Lt. Carson
as Lt. Brule
as Mary
as Margaret
as Altman
as Skerritt's Friend
as Stranger
as Midwife #1
as Midwife #2
as Bob Muldoon
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Critic Reviews for Ain't Them Bodies Saints
All Critics (133) | Top Critics (55) | Fresh (102) | Rotten (31)
[Ain't Them Bodies Saints] is... beautifully shot, highly aestheticized, ponderously lyrical, dramatically inert, lugubriously scored, and weirdly sanctimonious.
The problem with the film, written and directed by David Lowery, is that it's tepidly drawn, with molasses-like pacing and an anticlimactic ending that does little to keep the audience invested.
It's one of the best films of the year, and its shrugging Malick comparisons should be taken with a grain of salt - particularly for those of us whose admiration of the man is held with some reservation and qualification.
Like a bastard love child of Terrence Malick and Robert Altman, David Lowery's crime drama shuffles to its own drummer.
The astute use of folk and bluegrass defines the palette of this film as much as the acting or the cinematography.
Lowery falls back on a number of clichés in his indie romance-cum-Western, drowning the actors in melancholy sunshine and letting them mumble like mad. What he gets right are the characters.
Audience Reviews for Ain't Them Bodies Saints
A sad, melancholy Bonnie & Clyde-like crime drama that clearly borrows from Malick, and it is nice to see the way that Lowery approaches his narrative even if it is quite conventional and worth seeing more for its strong performances than by what he actually wants to tell.
Super Reviewer
Dark and lyrical to a fault, Ain't Them Bodies Saints is an exercise of style over substance, but is elevated by fantastic performances from Casey Affleck, Rooney Mara, Ben Foster, and Keith Carradine. The tone of this western sets up a tragic story about consequences and family as an outlaw tries to make it home to his family, and that hopelessness is reflected in the (now cliche) backdrop of a rural Texas setting.
Super Reviewer
Simple, beautiful and achingly tender. Very good Film! Good story which needs some touching up, but the acting is first rate. It is a character study, a study in melancholy told in real, human terms and not in movie terms. And maybe that is its only flaw, that truth be told, real life is less dramatic and more grimy than make-believe. This is another triumph for Rooney Mara who is excellent as a strong, young woman who desires a better life and a man who can't get it for her. There's great irony in the way events turn out for her and it's all totally believable. I was also impressed with Casey Affleck's performance as her lover and small time criminal. Perhaps the film veers too closely at times toward stylish vagueness and too far from the broken heart of the story. But there is no denying this is a serious, authored work of art. The tale of an outlaw who escapes from prison and sets out across the Texas hills to reunite with his wife and the daughter he has never met.
Super Reviewer
Ain't Them Bodies Saints Quotes
| Bob Muldoon: | Sir, I used to be the devil. Now I'm just a man. |