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My family is nothing like this you may say. The disbelief of the twist in Savage Grace is what makes you open your mouth in awe. The film shows how happy lives can be turned upside down and turned into a nightmare when vast amounts of money is involved. The wealthy Bakelite family fortune declines the relationships within the family and makes them rather hostile. Some of the disturbances shown are incest, murder, homosexuality, etc. Consequently the complete disintegration of the family is witnessed.

The director has done a good job at shocking the audience with some rather graphic representations of a dry and cold relationship between family members. However, the plot, screen play and character development are fairly superficial and do not bond with the viewer. The film remains just that, a movie, the audiences do not engage as much apart from the gruesome scenes. The fact that the film does not have a clear-cut hero or villain, makes it that much more difficult to embellish this movie.

Most characters are shown to have skeletons in their closets. Perhaps it is a reflection of real every day life and the movement away from typical Hollywood superhero blockbusters. You have to dig deep for this movie, but its worth it. You need to be mentally prepared in order to grasp and fully understand the underlining messages of the film. The fact that the characters aren't shown to age over time is one of the main things that make this movie look cheap, like as if its been hacked together quickly. The inclusion of minute details distracts the viewer from the main story.

As all family tales, the story begins in New York City after the birth of Anthony Bakeland in 1946 and then moves forward in time to the present state of the film in 1972. Eventually Anthony is almost forced to commit murder and therefore kill his mother who at that time is having her social status increased. The fowl play, deteriorating and disturbing conditions between mother and son are all depicted in great detail in the film.

Julianne Moore who plays Barbara, Anthony's mother had been married to a wealthy but cold husband, Brooks. The enormous neglect, which she receives on his behalf, forces her to become withdrawn and focus all her attention on her only son. However, Anthony too falls victim to his fathers neglect. His frustration at that is evident as he grows up resentful and becomes homosexual. He lives a carefree life and begins spiraling out of control. There is almost a sense of eeriness to this. As this story depicts a well-known fact, that money does not make one happy. This making the audience uncomfortable as they too may have purchase experienced something similar.

Overall the film fails to gain a feel of a well thought out and expensive movie. The character development is fairly artificial, the plot can have holes, the characters may look immortal, but one thing the movie does well is deliver the message that all people are social animals and hate neglect. Definitely a movie only worth watching during psychology classes.

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