Buster's Mal Heart

Released Apr 28, 2017

1h 38m

Mystery & Thriller

Drama

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70%

50 Reviews

Tomatometer

55%

1,000+ Ratings

Audience Score

An eccentric mountain man is on the run from the authorities, surviving the winter by breaking into empty vacation homes in a remote community. Regularly calling into radio talk shows, where he has acquired the nickname"Buster," to rant about the impending Inversion at the turn of the millennium, he is haunted by visions of being lost at sea, and memories of his former life as a family man.

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Regina P

I'm a huge fan of Rami Malek's acting. I could watch him act in anything. His acting is just mesmerizing to me. I hope Hollywood gives him more roles. This was good. I wasn't crazy about it, but Rami always shows up to work. He did his part.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

02/14/24

Full Review

O t

Raw and emotional. Best movie I've seen in years honestly ❤️

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

02/26/23

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jim d

As a fan of Rami Malek and slow, brooding movies, I really wanted to like this one. Unfortunately there just isn't much that's compelling here.

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

ronald h

"Buster's Mal Heart" will infuriate some viewers, annoy others, delight others, and generate quite a few Google "explanations." It's incoherent yet coherent. It's not filmed sequentially, yet it has a cohesive feel. Rami Malek plays Jonas / Buster in alternating scenes of the same man at different points in his life—or more precisely, in his head. He's a man split in two. One of him is Jonas, a caring family man who works as a hotel concierge and lives with his in-laws so he and his wife can save money for a piece of property and someday live a simple, independent life. The other is Buster, a wild-eyed, bearded mountain man who breaks into vacation homes, eating people's food and sleeping in their beds. Malek also plays a third character in dreamlike sequences, symbolically adrift in a rowboat in the middle of the ocean. This film is absolutely bursting with symbolism, much of it biblical. It raises more questions than it answers. It doesn't proceed in a linear fashion from beginning to end. You just watch and absorb. This review has been deliberately obscure in terms of details. That's because it's impossible to describe. Personally, I was drawn into it, and I think most thoughtful viewers will be, too. The rest of you—Well, you're probably better off sticking with the usual Hollywood fare. Sarah Adina Smith is to be congratulated for making such an audacious and weird film.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

03/30/23

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tony h

A bit discontinuous, but they may improve with a second viewing?!

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

donna m

New Title - A slow moving abstract sloth! He is a great actor but it was no thriller. I dozed off a couple of times. Yes a mystery - as in what the F did I just watch. Waste of my time. I don't do surreal. It was not intellectually deep. Best described as a slow moving abstract sloth.

Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

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Sarah Adina Smith

Director

Rami Malek

Buster

DJ Qualls

Brown

Kate Lyn Sheil

Marty

Lin Shaye

Pauline

Toby Huss

Deputy Winston

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Buster's Mal Heart: Trailer 2

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Buster's Mal Heart: Trailer 1

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Ben Sachs

Chicago Reader

This peculiar indie drama scores points for originality and impressive performances, though it's elusive in its design and feels unsatisfying on the whole.

Apr 13, 2020

Full Review

Julie Hinds

Detroit Free Press

Smith's eye for arresting images is as strong as Malek's gift for being both present in the moment and lost in his character's anxieties.

Jun 5, 2017

Full Review

Michael Phillips

Chicago Tribune

Whatever wavelength the quietly riveting Malek and the equally intriguing Sheil are on, they're on it together.

Rated: 3/4

Jun 1, 2017

Full Review

Elissa Suh

MUBI

Sarah Adina Smith teasingly dips to sci-fi, only to haphazardly scatter it all for the sake of philosophy. In lieu of a rule-bound universe, we get a smattering of quantum mechanics, apocalypse myths and a shaking fist at God and the Bible.

Feb 27, 2020

Full Review

Ashlee Blackwell

Graveyard Shift Sisters

These themes of class and ethnicity in Buster's Mal Heart aren't frying pan head blows. They're subtle in order to sneak into your subconscious and reveals how a system, also subtly placed in Reagan's America is shattered.

Feb 11, 2020

Full Review

Michael J. Casey

Boulder Weekly

All work and no play...

Aug 3, 2019

Full Review

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Synopsis

An eccentric mountain man is on the run from the authorities, surviving the winter by breaking into empty vacation homes in a remote community. Regularly calling into radio talk shows, where he has acquired the nickname"Buster," to rant about the impending Inversion at the turn of the millennium, he is haunted by visions of being lost at sea, and memories of his former life as a family man.

Director: Sarah Adina Smith
Producer: Dan Cogan, Geralyn White Dreyfous, Wendy Ettinger, Julie Parker Benello, Mynette Louie
Screenwriter: Sarah Adina Smith
Distributor: Well Go USA
Production Co: Snowfort Pictures, Everything Is Everything
Genre: Mystery & Thriller, Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Apr 28, 2017, Limited
Release Date (Streaming): May 22, 2017
Box Office (Gross USA): $72.6K
Runtime: 1h 38m

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