Take (film)

Plot

Ana Nichols attends the execution of a criminal, Saul Gregor, whose actions led to tragedy. Interspersed with the present day scenes, flashbacks tell the stories of Ana and Saul.

Cast

Reception

Rotten Tomatoes, a review aggregator, reports that 45% of 29 surveyed critics gave the film a positive review; the average rating was 5.1/10. The site's consensus reads: "A story of redemption held together with flashbacks, Take has moments of emotional intensity, but is ultimately undone by preachiness." Metacritic rated it 22/100. Ronnie Scheib of Variety wrote, "[T]he fragmented past is far more dramatic and suspenseful than the present-day story of retribution, which creates a sense of imbalance and spiritual anticlimax." Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter called it a "grueling, hard-to-take drama that is well worth the viewer's effort". Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times rated it 2/4 stars and called it "a monotonous slog through dirgeland". Robert Abele of the Los Angeles Times wrote, "Take is called a thriller in its press notes, but it's really one of those tragedy-under-a-microscope slogs that assumes a surfeit of storytelling angles makes a harrowing incident automatically more interesting." Nathan Lee of The New York Times wrote, "If there is anything the cinema needed less than another angst-ridden, cross-cutting tragedy about crime, fate, memory and redemption, it's the kind shot in an ugly monochromatic palette suggesting a world drained of emotions and filmmakers parched of imagination."