Outlaw Chic

MIDNIGHT SPECIAL (B-minus) - This is a fascinating film from the talented Jeff Nichols, but it pretty much falls apart in the final reel, resulting in a huge disappointment.

Nichols flew out of the gates with the wonderful trilogy of "Shotgun Stories," "Take Shelter" and "Mud." Those first two starred Michael Shannon, who takes over here as Roy, a rough-hewn father who goes on the lam with his gifted young son pursued by the federal government and a cult that covets the boy's supernatural powers. A mature-looking Kirsten Dunst is the frock-wearing, pig-tailed mother. Joel Edgerton signs on as Lucas, a former sheriff's deputy who helps Roy and the boy, tender little Alton (Jaeden Lieberher, the imp from "St. Vincent").

Adam Driver is in full quirk mode for the role of Sevier, a government agent in charge of tracking the outlaws. Driver is back on his game after getting sidetracked by the thankless villain role in the "Star Wars" series. He provides both gravitas and subtle comic relief, as critical connective tissue for the narrative.

Like Nichols' previous offerings, "Midnight Special" is fat with foreboding. Young Alton suffers from visions and has powers of extra-sensory perceptions. On a car ride, he'll burst into Spanish, and it's just a matter of flipping the dial on the car radio to figure out that he's merely channeling a DJ's banter, word for word in real time. But more important, Alton similarly has tapped into government transmissions that contain top-secret information regarding the military and national security.

Nichols takes a little too much time setting up his premise (the run time is a bulky 1 hour 52 minutes), but his track record has earned him the right to demand such indulgence. Shannon burns with intensity, and Dunst unpacks a character slowly being leached of the cult's poisons. Edgerton is solid as the sidekick who must commit a serious crime in order for the men and boy to continue their journey.

The screenplay (also by Nichols) crackles at times. At one point Roy exhibits a tender side while assuring his son that he's not a burden: "I like worrying about you." The disdain for the shadowy cult, and the false salvation of religion in general, are summed up beautifully in one line, again from Roy: "Good people die everyday believing in things." Once the table is set by an unsettling first hour, we're ready to barrel toward a powerful reckoning.

Unfortunately, Nichols runs off the rails, as he gets overwhelmed by the sci-fi story and overly enamored of the special effects at his disposal. Alton has a penchant for shooting laser beams out of his eyes. A fantastical extra-terrestrial world magically appears. All the while, we're never quite sure what the government's after. Nor can we figure out why the surveillance and military might of the U.S. government can't track down a boy traveling the main roads in a Bondo-colored heap piloted by a couple of thugs.

By the climax, the viewer feels a bit conned. It's as if this were some classic Steven Spielberg thriller all along (perhaps with a Stephen King script). There are echoes of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," and the rather cheesy ending has all the nuance of "E.T.," albeit tweaked with cool CGI effects. The ending feels like a cheat, and it makes the movie's two halves feel like one big bait-and-switch.

MOJAVE (C+) - There's no really good reason for this movie to exist. Billed as a thriller, "Mojave" tells the familiar tale of a privileged man going off to the desert to find himself, only to find trouble instead, this time in the form of a psychotic killer.

The uninspiring Garrett Hedlund borrows the shtick of Stephen Dorff in Sofia Coppola's "Somewhere" to play Tom, a disaffected actor who flees from the burdens of stardom and drives his Jeep out to the Mojave desert, seeking meaning. There he runs into devilish drifter Jack (Oscar Isaac), and the two immediately choreograph a cat-and-mouse game in which Jack will follow Tom back to L.A. seeking an eventual showdown.

Isaac is truly inspired as the philosopher madman -- inspired again by yet another version of an Al Pacino character, with a little De Niro head-shaving thrown in for good measure. Toss in Mark Wahlberg as a crazed producer who is partial to drugs and prostitutes, and you've got a movie that's a little too cartoonish for its own good.

Hedlund is essentially a cipher, providing little depth to his moping character who is unable to find happiness despite his beautiful French girlfriend and his comfortable lifestyle. Tom's opening scene boils down to this observation: "When you get what you want, what have you got?" But there's no payoff to that existential conundrum. Isaac has little to play off of and thus comes off as shrill and over-the-top. An early scene with the two men around a campfire is full of philosophical babble that leads nowhere.

This is the second effort as director for William Monahan, who wrote "The Departed" for Martin Scorsese. Here, he's flailing with ideas, and he shows little flair behind the camera. Isaac, as always, is fun to watch. There's a bit of suspense as to which man will come out alive. But by the end of the movie, it's rather difficult to care about the outcome.