Breathe In (2013)

Genre

Drama | Romance

Director

Drake Doremus

Country

USA

Cast

Guy Pearce, Felicity Jones, Amy Ryan, Mackenzie Davis, Ben Shenkman, Alexander Wentworth, Hugo Becker, Brendan Dooling, Kyle MacLachlan, Lucy Davenport, Jenny Anne Hochberg, Elise Eberle, Nicole Patrick, Brock Harris, Stephen Sapienza, Matthew Daddario

Storyline

When a foreign exhange student (Felicity Jones) arrives in a small upstate New York town, she challenges the dynamics of her host family's relationships and alters their lives forever.

Opinion

Remember Like Crazy? That beautiful romantic drama directed by Drake Doremus and starring Felicity Jones? I do, so I was expecting big things from this one. Unfortunately, it let me down.

Utterly predictable, Breathe In is an extremely tedious melodrama as well as a waste of incredible actors. 

Co-screenwriters Drake Doremus and Ben York surely did not a good job here. Pretty much nothing happens in the film until the ending comes. I must correct myself. Until the predictable ending comes. Maybe they wanted to make a portrayal of midlife falling apart, or maybe it was all about the affair, I don't know, it just didn't work. They spent most of the running time "cooking" the characters' emotions, only to let them explode - and waste them - in the ending.

The dialogue is also weak. And Jones's Sophie's long and intense stares at Pearce's Keith were kind of annoying.

Also, as pointed out by Pearce in the movie, Sophie seems much older than she is. The reason? Felicity Jones is way too old to play a 18 year old. Period.

Neither the beautiful cinematography, nor the wonderful soundtrack, nor Guy Pearce and Felicity Jones's good performances can't turn this mess into gold, or anything close to gold.

I conclude saying that the only breath of fresh air came from my window, as I needed some to stay awake.

Quotes

Sophie: It's so hard to actually do what you want to do.