"Puzzle"--movie review--must see

@GreatMartin (23677)
Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
August 10, 2018 8:35pm CST
The movie opens with Agnes (Kelly Macdonald) vacuuming the floors, setting the table, making food trays, baking a cake, hanging a Happy Birthday sign and placing balloons around the house and leads into a party scene with her coming out with the cake with candles and everybody singing "Happy Birthday"--to her! She is not only the birthday woman but the maid, caterer, hostess, wife, mother, housekeeper and, it turns out, fast at putting jigsaw puzzles together. One of her birthday gifts is a jigsaw puzzle and when she eventually sits down to work she is surprised at how quick she can work it out and decides to buy another one and finds out about a store in New York City that majors in selling jigsaw puzzles. Agnes travels in from her Connecticut home starting a journey on discovering herself as a person. Along the way we meet Robert (Irrfan Khan), a millionaire inventor who lives in a beautiful home, impersonally furnished, in Manhattan whose wife left him, and he is looking for a partner to enter puzzle competitions. Agnes has a loving husband, Louie, (David Denman), a domineering man who loves his wife and kids but expects them to wait on him hand and foot. They have two sons Gabe (Austin Abrams) who wants to take a year off before going to college and Ziggy (Bubba Weiler) who is expected to work in his father's garage but who wants to be a cook. "Puzzle" is a gem of a movie, an independant film, showing a character who grows right before our eyes starting off slowly in slow increments and watch her take small steps before taking large ones. Kelly Macdonald embodies that growth involving us with her own surprises at who she really is underneath the meek, church going, obedient wife and mother presented at the opening of the movie. David Denman, as the father who looks at a son who wants to be a cook as 'unmanly', gives a performance equal to Macdonald's and is particularly moving in a family scene and another where he confronts the wife he thought he knew but is a puzzle to him now. Khan, Abrams and, particularly Weiler (I just wish he would change that first name!) are strong supporting actors. The screenplay by Oren Moverman and Polly Mann only falter near the ending while the director Marc Turtletaub has a very strong group of actors to work with, guides them and seems to stay out of their way when he should. "Puzzle" is a 'must see' movie for many reasons but mainly to watch an actress take her character through life changes, make those changes believable to her and us and is surrounded by actors who react to the changes that happen to her as we would. Movietrailer
PUZZLE is a closely observed portrait of Agnes, who has reached her early 40s without ever venturing far from home, family or the tight-knit immigrant commun...
5 people like this
5 responses
@xander6464 (40872)
• Wapello, Iowa
16 Aug 18
I loved Kelly Macdonald in Boardwalk Empire. It's just too bad Nucky isn't in this one.
1 person likes this
@xander6464 (40872)
• Wapello, Iowa
21 Aug 18
@GreatMartin Never mind. I keep forgetting how young you are. It would take too long to explain.
@BabeSays (8576)
• Mauritius
11 Aug 18
Thank you for sharing I didn't read the whole thing because I am scared it might spoil the suspense. I watched the trailer. This is a kinda of movie I like watching. I'll have to watch it.
1 person likes this
@GreatMartin (23677)
• Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
11 Aug 18
I do not read reviews to a movie before I see it just as I won't/don't give any spoilers in my reviews--just what it is basically about.
1 person likes this
@GreatMartin (23677)
• Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
11 Aug 18
@BabeSays That's why I don't give them!! LOL
1 person likes this
@BabeSays (8576)
• Mauritius
11 Aug 18
@GreatMartin Oh that's great...I hate spoilers. It kills all the fun.
1 person likes this
@RasmaSandra (73407)
• Daytona Beach, Florida
11 Aug 18
Sounds like a really interesting movie. Thanks for the review.
1 person likes this
@GreatMartin (23677)
• Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
11 Aug 18
It is a gem of a movie!
1 person likes this
@JohnRoberts (109857)
• Los Angeles, California
11 Aug 18
This sounds good. I will check it out. Kelly Macdonald is so very Scottish voiced and I was taken aback by her American voice in the trailer.
1 person likes this
@GreatMartin (23677)
• Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
11 Aug 18
She really is brilliant in this. Sadly she will probably be overlooked at award time!
1 person likes this
@Courage7 (19633)
• United States
11 Aug 18
So glad you enjoyed this film Martin. I will look for it on your recommendation. Thank you.
1 person likes this
@GreatMartin (23677)
• Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
11 Aug 18
It is one of the best I have seen this year ---so far! :O)