The Vanishing of Sidney Hall (2018)

Great intertwined script. Loved it. Good depth and interesting characters

Insanely talented people exist. Some of these extremely talented people are very young, some of them are artists, some of them both. If they are lucky, they don't succumb to their own success, and if they are even more lucky, they can live their talent at least for a short while. Some people just can't stand very talented young people who believe in their own gift. To them, those prodigies are pretentious or even dispicable. I'm quite certain those people are just jealous.But it gets worse. When this very talented young person is actually a fictional character, around whom a movie revolves, supposedly that makes that movie in itself pretentious and dispicable? What nonsense.The titular character Sydney Hall becomes a star because his first book turns out to be a groundbreaking masterpiece. This is just the essence of the story. If you don't like the character (to be clear, i did like the character) that doesn't mean you have to dislike the movie. Do you automatically dislike any movie about Hitler?In another review i saw someone point out that there were many unlikely events and facts serving as plot devices. What kind of logic is that? In any story, events happen for reasons, and it's remarkable reasons and events that make remarkable stories. To make another comparison (spoiler for another movie alert!): the protagonist of Shawshank redemption has stone working as a hobby and gets the prison personell to give him stone working tools, which he uses to dig a tunnel. How unlikely!For these people i have some advice on how to enjoy way more movies, and to enjoy movies way more. It's called suspension of disbelief.Just go with the story as it is told. And this one is beautiful.

This movie is exquisite. I have never written a review before but I have to with some of these low ratings. I am still thinking about this movie days after watching and that says something. It's hard to describe it accurately. It's haunting, creepy, romantic, smart, beautifully shot and acted. I can't for the life of me figure out why the ratings are so bad. What else do you want in a movie?!

This is a movie that tells a story of a young man who is a talented writer, possessed by that one abiding talent and one sweet, star crossed love. How these play out over years of fame, horror, loss and search for a dream that has no address is the substance of the story. Told out of sequence, the story requires characters we must care about and all of the main characters deliver. Elle Fanning is particularly moving as a romantic young girl growing up in the unromantic adult world of hard truths and painful realities. The mysteries at the heart of the story telegraph their solutions, but the impact is only slightly lessened as they play out over decades of wounded lives. A well done tale.