Director: Lenny Abrahamson

Starring: Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, Joan Allen, Sean Bridgers, Tom McCamus, William H. Macy

Irish director Lenny Abrahamson’s adaptation of Emma Donoghue’s Man Booker Prize shortlisted novel Room (which she wrote the screenplay for) is a tender and at times thrilling drama about the love of a mother for her son in the face of extreme circumstances.

Five-year-old Jack (Jacob Tremblay) lives with his mother (Brie Larson) in Room, a small, grimy, sound-proof shed with a skylight. He has lived there his whole life. It is just the two of them except for once a week in the evening when he must hide in the wardrobe while a mysterious man known only as ‘Old Nick’ (Sean Bridgers) comes to drop off supplies and ‘visit’ his mother. As an audience we make assumptions about Jack and his Ma’s situation and how they came to be there, but Jack never questions it. In his limited perspective there is Room, there is outer space and there are the planets that he sees on TV, but they aren’t real. Only Room is real. Continue reading →