An incredibly emotional and human movie that will stay in your mind well past the end credits.
What makes Waves so fascinating is that it essentially two movies. As soon as one story ends, the next begins. This easily feels like watching a movie and its sequel back to back. The first is excellent and the second is one of the best movies of the year. It is hard to talk about the second without spoiling the first. However I will say that it deals with very complex emotions without ever once simplifying them. There are moments that challenge us to deal with the complexities of our own lives and how we deal with them. These are done extremely intelligently and without any forced emotions. Both parts of this film paint nothing as black or white. We have to decide for ourselves how we are to feel about what is happening on screen or how we are supposed to feel as the characters we see on screen. This film paints life the way it really is and just as life has no simple answers neither does anything in this movie. The first part of the movie is much more conventional while the second part feels like nothing I have ever seen before. There is such an incredible sense of lyrical poetry and pure emotion in the second part that it is honestly rare for any film to achieve. This is accompanied by a pure sense of cinematic freedom that is even rarer. While the first part is essentially more conventional, it is told extremely well and with a deep complexity and thought provoking power that most films dealing with the theme of a teenager's life spinning completely out of control don't have.
This is easily one of the best looking movies of the year. Director Trey Edward Shults and cinematographer Drew Daniels give their all to this movies visual look. Each shot is perfectly composed from the angle to the use of color to the placement of everything on screen. This is a movie I truly could not take my eyes off of. Yet these shots were not just there to look beautiful, they are perfectly in tune with the emotion of the story. In fact they make each scene so much more emotionally powerful.
This is easily a must watch movie for any even slightly interested in film.
-Michael J. Ruhland
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