Movie Review: Room..its confines are its best times

The worst thing you can do before you watch Room is to watch the movie trailer. Even if you watch the first 20 seconds, it’ll give away all that the Room has in store in terms of plotline and plot twists. Then again, it might not be as bad because the Room is really about the presentation and the performances than what happens to its occupants.

Working in the tiny space that the Room offers can be an exhausting and claustrophobic task. However, the director does a brilliant job and coupled with the exquisite camerawork gives us the best moment the movie has to offer, within those confines. Sure, its intense and not at all pretty, still it delivers what it needs to. As the audience, you too begin to feel confined, wonder if the room extends to more than it appears and sympathize with the occupants of the room. This would be roughly the first half stage of the two hour runtime. So far, so very good.

The movie makes references to Alice in Wonderland and the rabbit hole she disappears into. That is an apt frame of reference to wonder at what goes wrong in the second half. Given perhaps a thousand possibilities after the limited arena in the first half, the Room begins to lose its firm structure and foundations. If this is done on purpose by the director, to align with the confusion its central characters feel by the course of events, it would be a masterstroke. Unfortunately, it just feels like the director (or maybe the writer since this is a book adaptation) genuinely got confused with what to do with all the options now available. It is only in its final 20 minutes that that movie truly redeems itself and gives meaningful dialogues and some structure to what it wants to convey – the ending being particularly noteworthy.

There are gaping plotholes and convenient contrivances in the Room but all that can be ignored and forgotten simply because of the earnest performance of the mother and son at the heart of this unusual tale. An absolutely astounding performance by child actor Jacob Tremblay is more than ably supported by a wonderful performance by Brie Larson. These two are the life of the movie and together deliver its most memorable moments – though the feather in the Room’s cap is that you view the entire movie from the eyes of the child. In a side act, we also have a short but credible performance from Joan Allen (Pamela Landy from the Bourne series).

Barring the half hour that the Room comes somewhat off its hinges, it offers a deeply stirring peep into a beautiful mother-son relationship and the innocence and simplicity of childhood despite its terrifying situation. I can say this much for sure – you’ll emerge from the theater with a better appreciation for your life and the world you live in – for that and the astounding performances its worth glancing through the skylight and looking into the world of the Room