Mass

If you enjoy reading my Spoiler-Free reviews, please follow my blog @ https://www.msbreviews.com I don't know why now, but I didn't watch Mass as a premiere during Sundance. Instead, I left it to an on-demand viewing for the next day. As soon as I finished Wild Indian (which I sort of liked), I knew I made a mistake. Mass is one of the heaviest, unbreathable, overwhelmingly emotional films I've ever seen. This review was supposed to have been up 24h ago, but I needed to process everything and sleep on it. It's even more shocking considering this is a feature directorial debut for Fran Kranz,…

The emotionally exhausting film “Mass” is an impressive screenwriting and directorial debut from Fran Kranz. It’s exceptionally well-written, skillfully acted, and thoughtfully explores the idea of grief, guilt, and forgiveness. This film will break you. Two couples, Richard (Reed Birney) and Linda (Ann Dowd), and Jay (Jason Isaacs) and Gail (Martha Plimpton), meet face-to-face after a tragic event connected their two families over 6 years ago. They’re hoping that talking out their anger, sadness, and frustrations will finally allow them to put their painful memories in the past and move…

Summary: 8/10: a devastating, essential film anchored by four exceptional performances and a director wise enough to trust his actors and his subject. Four people meet in a church basement. Two couples, years after a school shooting tore their lives apart: Jay and Gail, whose son was killed; Richard and Linda, whose son was the shooter. What follows is 111 minutes of conversation, grief, anger, guilt, and the agonizing question of whether forgiveness is even possible. Fran Kranz's directorial debut is brave, austere filmmaking. He sets his four actors — Jason Isaacs, Martha Plimpton, Reed…