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The Burning Plain

Play trailer Poster for The Burning Plain R 2009 1h 46m Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
Watchlist Tomatometer Popcornmeter
38% Tomatometer 79 Reviews 56% Popcornmeter 5,000+ Ratings
In the present, Sylvia (Charlize Theron) appears to lead a confident life as a restaurant manager but she cleverly hides her promiscuity, self-mutilation, and suicidal impulses. In the past a young girl named Mariana (Jennifer Lawrence) tries to figure out why her mother (Kim Basinger) began an affair as she enters into a relationship with the son of her mother's lover. The threads of these dysfunctional lives are increasingly tied into a potent knot.
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The Burning Plain

The Burning Plain

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Critics Consensus

This heavily symbolic, melodramatic multi-narrative drama lacks emotional resonance.

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Critics Reviews

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Melissa Anderson Film Comment Magazine 11/17/2013
What's that smell? The plain isn't the only thing that's charred in screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga's directorial debut; subtlety goes up in flames too. Go to Full Review
Perri Nemiroff CinemaBlend 08/12/2010
3/5
Arriaga's multi-narrative format got the best of him. Rather than deliver a sense of shock and awe, it's swallowed up by complexity, leaving you to wonder, "This is it?" Go to Full Review
David Stratton The Australian 04/26/2010
4/4
When so many cinema releases are instantly forgettable, The Burning Plain clings to the memory... Go to Full Review
Jason Best Movie Talk 11/21/2020
The Burning Plain has individual scenes that are powerful and moving, but in the end the whole is considerably less than the sum of its parts. Go to Full Review
Debbie Lynn Elias Behind The Lens 11/07/2019
A calculated intensity. High polish. Exquisite cinematography. An interesting story with an extremely well done interlacing of "chapters" and characters. Go to Full Review
Mattie Lucas From the Front Row 08/05/2019
2/4
Both uninspired and languorous, a bland and anonymous concoction. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Lando R Jul 6 Carece de mais profundidade, principalmente quando se trata de um sentimento de culpa tão forte, o fato em si é capaz de destruir um ser humano. See more Alain E @AlainE Jan 27 It’s supposed to be heavy drama, but it’s full of cliches. In the first scene a woman raises from a bed and asks a man to leave. She then stands naked at the window as a family walks underneath scandalized. We then learn that she is the hostess at an upscale restaurant but when she asks to go on a cigarette break she cuts herself instead with a sharp rock. Then she appears to contemplate to jump from a cliff to the raging sea underneath. She then has sex with one of the rich patrons of her establishment, after she just cut herself! All the time there is a mysterious man who follows her. In the process we had learned that her sexual partner in the first scene was one of the kitchen staff, whom she ignores when she sees him. All that with Charlize Theron in the first 8 minutes. Regrettably, I will miss the casual sex scenes with Kim Basinger and Jennifer Lawrence. See more Jerod S @jeroduptown 08/29/2024 Charlize, Lawrence and Basinger are in it for the family drama. The problem with this flick is it's all one big conflict...no resolution...just a bunch of adultery. See more steve d 12/13/2022 Melodramatic but effective. See more 11/22/2022 Il racconto su più linee temporali di un personaggio rotto, a causa di un trauma da lui stesso procurato; riesce in parte a scorrere soprattutto quando arrivano quegli avvenimenti che ne modificano la trama, mentre è molto meno riuscito quando sono i dialoghi a farla da padrona. Si ha la costante sensazione però che tutti i personaggi siano intrappolati in una realtà che non li soddisfa, stretti dall'apatia della quotidianità non riescono a modificare in nessun modo il loro modo di essere. Non noioso ma nemmeno entusiasmante, questo dramma troppo spesso si adagia sull'espressività delle sue protagoniste femminili che ne elevano le interpretazioni ma che abbassano il ritmo oltremodo. See more 01/24/2022 This is a great movie, though it requires a lot of work to figure it out. It concerns a serious mistake made by one of the characters, and because the characters are shown at two or three different ages and played by different actors at the various time periods, It is difficult to know who is who at times. However, the shattered timeline is very effective at displaying the tortured mind and emotions of the protagonist. So here's a big hint --Jennifer Lawrence is the actor who gets to make the mistake. In the end it is clear who is who, if you haven't figured it out already, and it's a very emotional ending. BTW, if you happen to have read Pedro Paramo, you will know the territory you are in. See more Read all reviews
The Burning Plain

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Movie Info

Synopsis In the present, Sylvia (Charlize Theron) appears to lead a confident life as a restaurant manager but she cleverly hides her promiscuity, self-mutilation, and suicidal impulses. In the past a young girl named Mariana (Jennifer Lawrence) tries to figure out why her mother (Kim Basinger) began an affair as she enters into a relationship with the son of her mother's lover. The threads of these dysfunctional lives are increasingly tied into a potent knot.
Director
Guillermo Arriaga
Producer
Walter F. Parkes, Laurie MacDonald
Screenwriter
Guillermo Arriaga
Distributor
Magnolia Pictures
Production Co
Parkes/MacDonald
Rating
R (Nudity|Language|Sexuality)
Genre
Drama
Original Language
English
Release Date (Theaters)
Sep 18, 2009, Limited
Release Date (Streaming)
Jan 13, 2011
Box Office (Gross USA)
$200.4K
Runtime
1h 46m
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