Josh O’Connor is living a fevered year of cinema at this year’s LFF, with The History of Sound, The Mastermind, and the opening gala Wake Up Dead Man. Compared with the buzz and starry glow surrounding the new Knives Out film, The Mastermind feels quieter, more introspective, yet it is the one that draws him back to melancholy. Kelly Reichardt, the quiet cartographer of American life, finds in him the rare sadness that drifts through her cinema. Though he comes from England, O’Connor seems made for Reichardt’s world. Her America is not built on heroes but on ordinary souls who live with silence, longing, and unease.

Set in 1970s Massachusetts, The Mastermind follows James Blaine ‘JB’ Mooney (O’Connor), a former art student turned unemployed carpenter, who lives with his wife Terri (Alana Haim) and their two sons, Carl (Sterling Thompson) and Tommy (Jasper Thompson). Supported by his parents, Judge Bill Mooney (Bill Camp) and Sarah (Hope Davis), JB feels trapped in the quiet despair of his middle-class life while the Vietnam War rages and protests fill the streets. Hoping to reclaim a sense of purpose, he recruits two unreliable accomplices, Guy Hickey (Eli Gelb) and Ronnie Gibson (Javion Allen), to steal four Arthur Dove paintings from a Boston museum. The heist succeeds at first but unravels almost immediately, as JB’s lack of foresight and reckless attempt to profit from the theft draws the attention of the police and the FBI. As his family’s reputation crumbles and his life falls apart, he is forced to go on the run, experiencing a chaotic, humiliating, and distinctly unglamorous fugitive life on the road.

Full review: https://theweereview.com/review/the-mastermind/#google_vignette