Watch the new trailer of Andrew Garfield struggling to keep his home and soul around Michael Shannon in 99 Homes.
NewsSome of the best and most queasy buzz out of last year’s film festivals came from 99 Homes, a new drama dealing with the still raw subject of home eviction and the housing crisis that plunged a nation into a recession—except for the banks that were bailed out.
Taking on the scale of fable, director Ramin Bahrani’s 99 Homes imagines a Faustian pact between an evil-incarnate realtor (Michael Shannon) and the desperate single father he once evicted (Andrew Garfield). Determined to support his young son and aging mother (Laura Dern), Garfield’s unemployed construction worker agrees to go to work as the muscle for Shannon’s Rick Carver—the bank’s favorite real estate man used to evict people from their homes. It is an uncomfortably nauseating premise that demands viewing, through squinted outrage or not.
Indeed, there are films that reflect the sad truths of our times, and then there are films that use a twisted, distorted mirror to unmask the surreptitious horrors we pretend do not exist.99 Homes, which stunned Venice, could be the latter.
99 Homes bursts down the doors of movie theaters on September 25, 2015.
