Film Review – Restless

At this point, Gus Van Sant either makes completely impenetrable cinema for display on his own IKEA shelf of esoteric achievements (“Elephant,” “Paranoid Park,” “Last Days”) or he slips into mainstream mode, working with name actors and poignant material, creating features intended to be appreciated by a larger audience (“Milk”). “Restless” is an attempt to find a middle ground between approachable and cryptic, but it’s mainly affected, disastrously so, to a degree that’s unimaginably punishing. Allegedly a soft tale of lost souls connecting in the dusk of life, “Restless” instead feels like an Urban Outfitters catalog shoot, boasting two intolerable lead performances from young actors who treat extraordinary trauma as a lazy Sunday afternoon acting school exercise. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com