Excellent, a Must See

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

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

It's a movie where you're supposed to feel superior to Nebraska hillbilly redneck cave dwellers. If you're weird and gay and passive aggressively screaming for attention by being weird then you're a better person more evolved and cool. Btw the movie sort of veers off into nonsense and silence pretty early on and by the time it ends.....well it just ends cryptically with a tacked subplot right at the end

Cindy (Robin Weigert) is returning home to a family gathering with her Californian husband Don (Richard Schiff) and gay son Ryder (Logan Miller). Her rural Nebraskan relatives don't know about her son's homosexuality. Ryder agrees to follow his young cousin Molly (Ursula Parker) into the barn. After something happens, she runs out screaming and bleeding from her first period. Her angry father Keith (Josh Hamilton) imposes a threatening atmosphere.This is Matt Sobel's first theatrical release. There is an uncomfortable atmosphere throughout. He threatens to take the movie to the next level but it never gets there. At first, I thought that Ryder should tell them about his homosexuality which leaves them at ease about anything happening in the barn. Then I thought it's possible that the revelation would only exacerbate Keith's mistrust and anger. It may help to lay out that rural conservatism more explicitly in the beginning. A lot of things are left unsaid like the relationship between Cindy and Keith. It could have gone further. Oveall, there is a great atmosphere and solid acting. There is good tension but in the end, Sobel does not ignite it to the fullest.

A young man visiting relatives in rural Nebraska goes into a barn to play a game with a 9 year old cousin. She emerges screaming from the barn with a blood-stained dress and, to put it mildly, things go downhill from there.The strongest element of this film is also the element that makes it the most frustrating as a viewer--namely this is a movie that commits completely to holding the point of view of the main character, Ryder. There are undercurrents of emotion and resentment roiling beneath the setting of a folksy family reunion, in particular some very strained and strange dynamics between Ryder's mother and her brother (the father of the 9 year old girl). Ryder is totally lost at sea because not only is he on unfamiliar ground (a gay, California city boy out in the country), but his parents and especially his mother behave in a seemingly irrational manner as events continue to escalate.By the middle of the movie I was thinking "Will someone just PLEASE explain what is going on here?!?!?!". On the one hand, I appreciate that this is exactly how Ryder himself must feel. But on the other hand, I got anxious and frustrated waiting for the film to reveal the background context needed to understand what was happening--to the point that it was hard to sit through scene after scene of coded conversations and meaningful looks.I thought that the acting was very strong across the board, including the children.Aside from feeling like the limited point-of-view was a double-edged sword, my only other criticism is that there were certain character actions that were just way too illogical or dumb. For example, despite the fact that he was all but accused of molesting his cousin, Ryder several times allows himself to be alone with other young girls without any other adults even in earshot. I just didn't believe it. Why if you had been accused (and also implicitly threatened) would you ever allow yourself to be in a position again where there were no witnesses to your behavior? There were a few character decisions (necessary to move the plot along) that didn't feel like real character choices--and they stand out because for the most part the acting and writing does come across as very realistic.Generally speaking this is one I'd recommend, especially if you can watch it for free on a streaming service as I did.

First review on here.At first I couldn't figure out what was going on but eventually got it at the end. *SPOILER ALERT* Like, I couldn't figure out why the family stayed instead of leaving after the assumptions. Why his uncle was semi accusing him but invited him over for lunch. Why it came off like he was prostituting his daughter. Was his (the uncle) wife oblivious to what was going on? This movie was both weird & interesting. Throughout the whole movie I just kept saying "Huh? What in the world?" Just things like that.I'm trying to watch more independent movies without the predictable Hollywood ending.