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March 20, 2016

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鈥楳idnight Special鈥 an electrifying ride

By Lindsey Bahr | March 20, 2016, Sunday | Print Edition

“MIDNIGHT Special” is one of those rare, stimulating creations that grabs you and penetrates your bloodstream from start to finish. This unique tale about a kid with special powers skillfully melds mood and story, giving the entire experience the feel of a thrilling getaway chase — one that you’re part of, too. Director Jeff Nichols dares you to get in, shut up and come along for the late night drive down some desolate Southern roads where the headlights are optional and the mission is life or death.

As with his riveting 2011 breakout “Take Shelter,” Nichols doesn’t reveal details carelessly.

Take the first scene. We hear about a child’s abduction on a television broadcast. Then we discover that we’re with two men (Michael Shannon as Roy and Joel Edgerton as Lucas) in a motel room. They’re paranoid about something. Then we see a white bedsheet draped over the outline of what appears to be a child, and you realize you’re with the abductors. It’s an unsettling milieu.

But then Roy removes the bedsheet to reveal a child (Jaeden Lieberher) who is neither scared nor upset. He’s calm. He’s wearing noise cancelling headphones and pool goggles and there’s even ordinariness about it. The boy’s name is Alton and he is, to put it too simply, exceptional. Roy is his father.

He’s taken his son away from a religious cult led by Sam Shepard’s Calvin Meyer, whose service that night is interrupted by federal investigators who have also become interested in the kid. A skeptical, curious NSA agent (Adam Driver) shows up too.

The cult has been using Alton as their prophet. He goes into a trance and speaks in tongues and they take it for scripture.

To explain too much about Alton’s powers would be to destroy the shock of the revelations and the ingenuity with which they’re executed.

But “Midnight Special” peels the layers of the story away elegantly and confidently.

There is so much more here than that moment. There’s the desperate pursuit of spiritual fulfillment. There’s the blind trust of the awe inspiring but incomprehensible. There’s the simplicity of a parent’s unquestioning trust of their child — and the ever-present fear and knowledge that there will come a day when that child does not need you anymore.

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