Popular reviews

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  Review by Chris Upson

  if u would like good 3 reasons to watch: 
  a) Keanu Reeves is in it 
  b) he says this:

  "That's all we humans can do. Guess. Try. Hope. But, Justin, just pray you don't fool yourself into thinking you've got the answer. Because that's bullshit. The trick is living without an answer.
  ...
  I think."

  c) not even sure it's his best line in the movie

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  Review by kate ★★½

  i feel like i just watched 3 different movies, and one of them was only half finished

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  Review by DNA cinephile🏳️‍🌈 ★★★½

  Thumbsucker. 2005. Directed by Mike Mills.

  Mike Mills’s (married to Miranda July since 2009) Thumbsucker (2005) is an entertaining film but it is not his best. With a cast including Tilda Swinton (Audrey Cobb), Keanu Reeves (Mike Cobb), and Lou Taylor Pucci (Justin Cobb) and screenplay based on the novel by Walter Kirn, Mills explored the issue of thumb sucking (a form of stemming and an autistic disorder). In addition, he explored overmedicating children with Adderall and Ritalin. 

  Joaquin Baca-Asay’s cinematography was unique and a great deal of habitats were explored (interiors and exteriors). This is not a bad film but Thumbsucker is not of the caliber of Beginners (2010) and 20th Century Women (2016). After seeing C’mon C’mon (2021),…

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  Review by 🤟🏻jess🤟🏻 ★★★½

  would deliberately repeatedly fuck up my teeth just to visit dr. perry lyman

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  Review by bigphyzz ★★★

  Why do these kids always end up at NYU

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  Review by byrne ★★★★

  what’s with mike mills and making dramedies about kids with parental issues? im not complaining, but i just need to know if he’s in therapy

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  Review by Sam G ★★★★

  I forgot where I heard about this movie but once I saw how stacked this cast was, I had to. 

  Well for starters, the cast is awesome. Like I could just start listing names, Keanu FKN Reeves for example🙌🏻, but they ALL do a fantastic job. Not just your average coming of age too. How it’s structured, to how it deals with a lot of real life issues/messages, just all made for a nice meaningful watch. Plus for as down as it gets with the subject matter, it has some nice humor squeezed in. In the end, this one just lands for me and I enjoyed it. 7.6/10👍🏼

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  Review by Naughty aka Juli Norwood ★★ 2

  ___________________________________________________________________________________
  Film #22 of the February Movie Challenge : Keanu Reeves or Bust!
  letterboxd.com/naughty/list/february-movie-challenge-keanu-reeves-or/
  ___________________________________________________________________________________

  Would have liked it more had they reduced this 96 minute film by 95 minutes and 55 seconds! Leaving everything on the cutting room floor except for the scene where Matt Schramm (Benjamin Bratt) tells Justin Cobb (Lou Pucci) "We're all just scared little animals"

  Considering the mad talent featured in this film (Tilda Swinton, Keanu Reeves, Benjamin Bratt, Vince Vaughn) this little indie looked quite promising! The actors were all quite wonderful but try as they might not even their star power and amazing talent could save this film!

  I mean come on! You've snagged the great Tilda Swinton.. and the best you can do is squander her immense talent by casting her in a role where her crowning achievement involves (SPOILER ALERT) retrieving a drug filled balloon from Benjamin Bratt's arse by ramrodding her fist up the ole Hershey Highway!

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  Review by bira ★★★½ 1

  omg i love julian casablancas!

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  Review by nora ★★★½

  it's so fun to watch this debut after loving mike mills's two most recent narrative features for so much of my adult film life. he's definitely one of the first directors who i latched onto when i got to college and learned what an auteur is. he perfects how he constructs and interrogates parent-child relationships (and non-parent/child relationships—the whole "it takes a village" mentality of 20TH CENTURY WOMEN is here in a more understated way) in those later films but the threads are all here. in some ways this film feels scattered and unfocused, like mills is trying to fit too many ideas into 90 minutes, but at the same time none of the plot directions this story took felt…

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  Review by Kunga Sagar ★★★★

  A product of the indie scene of the 2000s, but Mills’ earnest style makes this simultaneously a therapeutic yet heart wrenching watch. It’s far more bitter and overwritten then his later features, even the resentment found in Beginners is laced with the loveliest of romance. Thumbsucker deals with teenage trauma and heartbreak head on, but thanks to a lovely Elliott Smith soundtrack (it could be a half assed B-movie but if you throw an Elliott track on there I’ll probably enjoy it), the angst isn’t obnoxious. Lou Taylor Pucci, as well as Jesse Eisenberg in The Squid and the Whale, play the most nervous and stubborn teens of 2005 (the snarky sibling dynamic in Squid can be found here, albeit for sadder reasons), and it makes for damn good “sadboi” cinema. Vince Vaughn is incredibly miscast while Keanu Reeves is perhaps cast too perfectly, and “Thirteen” and “Let’s Get Lost” are instant playlist additions.

  
  2005 Ranked

  Mike Mills Ranked

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  Review by Allison M. 🌱 ★★★

  I watchlisted this, because it was directed by Mike Mills. There are certain things about it that work: quirky story and good actors. However, Keanu Reeves' orthodontist tells the main kid Justin (Lou Taylor Pucci) that he's so much more than an orthodontist to him. Uh, okay? The mother (Tilda Swinton) is a draw, but I felt that she was passive for the most part, until the end when she says she can envision Justin in the path he's taking. I found that moving!

  Lou Pucci and Tilda Swinton had the same hair at one point and I found that funny!

  DVD bonus features are worth checking out: Mike Mills has a conversation with Walter Kirn, who wrote the novel. It was great to get their POV before reading Letterboxd reviews.

  P.S. Whitney Houston reference made me sad, because she was obviously alive at the time this film was released.