In
southeast Alaska, there are more than a few people finding themselves
at a crossroads, not only in their own careers and communities, but
in their own personal lives. Joe is a former fisherman with a
traumatic past invovling a boating accident that resulted in a couple
of deaths. Donna is asmall club singer with a history of falling for
men who are bad for her, and finds her emotionally troubles daughter
pulling farther away from her emotionally as time progresses. Bobby
is Joe's half-brother with a drug problem and when some baddies end
up knocking him off, Joe, Donna and Noelle end up on a deserted
island in a fight for survival.
Sometimes
being deep doesn't always equate to being great, as is evidenced with
the very intelligent by writer-director Sayles. What seems wrong is
the first hour of the film, which I suppose sets up the characters
effectively, but really LIMBO only begins to pay off by the last half
where the trio are stranded with seemingly no way off their deserted
island. This is a thinking person's movie, but some poor choices for
supporting actors and a dragging plot do little to bolster the
profound screenplay by Sayles. Perhaps it will only be talked about
for the ambiguous ending, which many will find infuriating, but in
retrospect will deem it fitting. Sayles is an excellent small-film
director, and while LIMBO has it's share of moments, it's the moments
between these moments that threaten to bog it down to the level of
almost becoming tediously dull.
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