This is How Movies Should Be Made

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

Well this movie just had its moments here and there. Jennifer Connelly is pretty good in the movie.There are various sacrifices she makes for her boyfriend, which gets conveyed mostly through her facial expressions and still makes you feel the pain. Anthony mackie is equally good too, but I felt his character was a little under developed and makes you question why Jennifer Connelly would go to that extent to protect him. Paul bettany has a good debut in my opinion and I am interested to see his directorial venture. Movie hits you with reality of life and how we don't appreciate the things we have.

Paul Bettany directs his wife Jennifer Connelly and Anthony Mackie, alongside a supporting cast featuring Rob Morgan, Amy Hargreaves, and Bruce Altman. The acting i thought was superb and it shows that true love can be found everywhere even when you live on the streets and you're a hobo. Connelly is a drug addict she has a family, she lost someone and Mackie's character also has a troubled past that is why i loved this film the direction was amazing Bettany throws things about their past in every scene and it feels so powerful and you feel something about the 2 leads that wins you over and this film totally won me over.

Shelter starts off badly with mumbling dialogue, most of which I found incredibly hard to hear throughout the film. Badly cut, shaky scenes with little meaning and I found Jennifer Connelly's character really irritating. She's a heroin addict who's ditched her child and fallen into a homeless drug addicted slump because her husband died. "I used to be someone" is the cardboard sign she puts out when asking for money. The other ways she gets it is letting a morally bankrupt security guard have sex with her, even asking for oral sex for just letting her sleep in the boiler room on the first night. I found both characters unlikeable in certain ways but despite the personal history they tell one another, its understandable why they have ended up the way they have.Its a miserable film but thats what it is to be homeless and treated like you don't exist, like you are nothing.Its just that Shelter fails to draw me into the story, and it dreary beyond belief. I love dramas but there was something lacking with Shelter. You could say it was boring.I'm also sad to see Jennifer Connelly, once a voluptuous beauty reduced to a wrinkled skeleton by her own doing. she was already gaunt way before she made Shelter.

What's the first thing that comes to mind when you think of New York? A vibrant cityscape? Glitz and glam? Written, produced and directed by Paul Bettany, Shelter is a bleak reminder that even the greatest cities in the world can be extremely unforgiving if time and destiny dictates it.So it is with Tahir (Anthony Mackie), a Nigerian Muslim with an expired visa, and Hannah (Jennifer Connelly), a suicidal heroin junkie. As an illegal immigrant, Tahir cannot seek communal shelter so makes do by scavenging through trash and busking on plastic buckets. When they meet and eventually fall in love, we learn that one is the victim of circumstance and the other by choice. They have different beliefs owing to different backgrounds but they find dependence and strength in each other. He will get her through her drug addiction and reconciled with her estranged family. She will become the only source of redemption for his violent past. Through drip-fed sympathy we feel their anguish, and just when we think it can't get any worse, Bettany settles for none less than a grim ending, but not before forcing Hannah and Tahir through increasingly stomach churning situations.Shelter could have been set in any city but Bettany's story is juxtaposed between New York's opulence and rock bottom poverty. In some ways it is dedicated to the couple who lived outside their Manhattan residence but in many ways it is an eye opening account of a worst case scenario that could befall anyone. It's a dark shade of New York (or any other first world city) we either don't see or choose not to, and that's all the more reason why this story had to be told. But in doing so, Bettany's approach is depressing, repulsive and even melodramatic. If such is the intended effect, Shelter has a lot of it and that's largely due to Connelly's solid performance in portraying the plight of a woman who has nothing left, and because she has nothing left, will do anything to survive. Connelly also looks the part, with bones and veins sticking out of what looks like a malnourished frame. On the other hand, Mackie is either miscast or isn't given much to work with. Besides his faltering Nigerian accent, I can't imagine how his character is so well built for a hungry hobo; unless of course, the physique he has in this film is a fundamental requirement that runs alongside his characters in Marvel superhero films.While there are other questions that go unanswered, including debatable motives from certain characters, a lot of energy is focused on the pathetic situation of a homeless individual. There's no doubt that this is the real world and that poverty can be as devastating as cancer. But even while Bettany's subject matter is loud and clear, his application of Murphy's Law gives away towards a predictable ending with even more melodrama. Overall, you could call it a sophomore effort but there is also every reason to believe that this isn't a directorial attempt for the heck of it. As a first attempt for an actor-turned-director, Bettany gives us a powerful film that hits the heart despite aiming for the head. I sincerely hope there's more where this came from.