Short Term 12

Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton

(R)

***

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“The best indie movies give you the feeling that their directors not only wanted but needed to make them,” said Owen Gleiberman in Entertainment Weekly. That’s the case with this debut about a group foster home, written by a young director who’s worked in one. Stars Brie Larson and John Gallagher Jr. both prove superb as the counselors who run the home, two conscientious young people who are hiding a romantic relationship—and a pregnancy—from the troubled teens they hope to guide. But “a war gets fought between authenticity and hokum” in this film, said Mike D’Angelo in the A.V. Club. Though the emotions on display early on “have a real-world level of complexity,” creator Destin Daniel Cretton eventually “succumbs to a screenwriter’s worst impulses,” goosing the story needlessly. Somehow, Larson even uses the phoniness to her advantage, said Joe Morgenstern in The Wall Street Journal. Grace, the “marvelously complex heroine” she’s created, is “dangerously tender” and “mysteriously serious,” and you’ll be glad you have an entire movie to decipher why.