The two-hours plus running time is a tad flabby. This becomes slightly predictable at the third dream, and the film sags slightly in the second act. Is Curtis somehow psychic? Is the approaching doom related to their daughter's illness? Does the ever-present threat of economic ruin somehow inform these impending cataclysmic events? Horror film tropes are employed in the nightmare sequences, as Curtis wakes up just as he is attacked. The film opens with big, brooding questions. The look on her face had me pushing back in my seat. Jessica Chastain plays his put-upon wife Samantha, and gets to test her range in a nightmare sequence where she is tempted by a breadknife and the sight of her husband's exposed neck. When he gives voice to his darkest fears in a very public forum, he is the definition of unhinged. Michael Shannon is superb as mad-or-is-he? Curtis. But that does not mean his fears are unfounded. He makes the decision to tell no one but medical professionals. That comment comes just as nightmares creep into the daytime for Curtis and the pressures of the possible descent of mental illness, and impending catastrophe, seep into his being. His mate Dewart tells him, kindly and a little enviously, that he has a good life. Curtis is in construction, a steady guy in a steady job taking care of his family. Take Shelter is a brooding, psychological thriller that does a wonderful job of generating foreboding and unease, while hinting at bigger thematic questions.
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