MOVIE REVIEW: Leave No Trace

Drama starring Ben Foster and Thomasin Mackenzie.Â A father and daughter are living in the woods around a big city and surviving peacefully.Â They live off the mushrooms and other food that grows in the woods and try to avoid contact with the outside world as much as possible.Â A simple mistake by the Daughter changes things for them forever.

Since I don’t watch trailers unless they are forced upon us at the start of the press shows, which is thankfully rare, I don’t know more about a film before seeing it other than it’s title.Â I do this to bring back the magic of the cinema and to either be pleasantly surprised or shocked with hatred for a film.Â When Leave No Trace popped up and you try to guess what the film is about and you see some photos you wonder ifÂ you are going to see A Quiet Place knock off, or something different.Â Leave No Trace is a different thing all together.

Ben Foster plays Will and Thomasin plays Tom.Â Their life is simple and in the woods they want for nothing.Â This is mainly because Tom doesn’t know what she is missing from the world of a normal teen girl.Â We never learn what happened to the mother in this family, she’s talked about, but only briefly.Â It seems that Will has some form of PTSD from serving in the military and groups of people and city noise seem to make things worse.Â Tom loves her life in the woods and the daily practices of hiding from the outside world are like a game for her.Â She’s intelligent and holds a lot of wonder for the world.Â She’s reading in the woods when a jogger thinks he spots her.Â This leads to the discovery of the camp by the authorities who are worried that Will isn’t providing a safe place to raise Tom.Â Will and Tom are brought into a place for evaluation and while the social workers and the police are worried that they will revert back to their living off the land ways.Â They are given a house in the country, with the conditions that Will takes a job, Tom goes to school, and that they practice what the authorities call the normal life.

The performances of Foster and Thomasin are what lifts this from what could have been rather dull movie about the effects of war on the returning soldier.Â Instead because Foster always looks like he’s barely holding things together in every role, but he remains controlled here, you get a bubbling tension beneath the surface.Â You know that if things kick off on a violent side he’d be aggressive enough to get them out of that situation but it’s going to take a lot for that to happen.Â Thomasin Mackenzie is a pure talent who’s quiet, almost ghost like, presence floats around trying to soak in as much information about the world around her.Â When the locations change and her eyes are opened to having friends and the real world around her she’s open to having these new experiences which irritates her father.

The two main characters are joined by a rock steady cast of supporting characters.Â But the film is about the single focus of Will, who wants the isolation and peace that living away from society brings, against the openness to learning and exploring the people and experiences of Tom.Â You feel bad for the girl, and for Will in his own selfish right to live how he wishes.Â The camera work and scenery are beautifully captured.Â While some will feel the story doesn’t go to enough places that would have lifted it slightly it’s a good steady story, nothing amazing but nothing awful.Â Reminded me of Captain Fantastic in a way, just the script isn’t that sharp, but still worth checking out.

[yasr_overall_rating size=”large”]