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'Wolves' is cliché-ridden and predictable

( R ) ( Monitor Movie Guide )

The movie stars Michael Shannon and Carla Gugino as an alcoholic novelist who's in debt to gangsters and his wife, respectively. 

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Courtesy of Juanmi Azpiroz/IFC Films
Taylor John Smith as Anthony Keller in Bart Freundlich’s 'Wolves.'
  • By Peter Rainer Film critic

I checked out Bart Freundlich’s “Wolves” because it features two of our finest actors, Michael Shannon and Carla Gugino. Shannon plays Lee, an alcoholic novelist who teaches writing at a New York community college and is heavily in debt to gangsters because of his gambling addictions; Gugino is Jenny, his loving and suffering wife. Their son, Anthony (Taylor John Smith), is a high school basketball star on track for a scholarship to Cornell.

It’s all terribly cliché-ridden and predictable, and the best I can say for it is that Shannon and Gugino do their best to convince us otherwise. Grade: C (Rated R for language throughout and brief sexuality.)

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