Review of “The Mastermind,” a film by Kelly Reichardt with Josh O’Connor

-After having been selected for the Official Competition of the 2025 Cannes Festival, the new film by the notable director of films such as River of Grass (1994), Old Joy (2006), Wendy and Lucy (2008), Meek’s Cutoff (2010), Night Moves (2013), certain women (2016) y First Cow (2019).
-We add an interview with Kelly Reichardt and a video review.

Premiere 10/16/2025

Published on 10/12/2025

MastermindUSA). Screenplay, editing and direction: Kelly Reichardt. Cast: Josh O’Connor, Sterling Thompson, Alana Haim, Jasper Thompson, Bill Camp, Hope Davis, Eli Gelb, Cole Dorman, John Magaro, Gaby Hoffman and Matthew Maher. Photography: Christopher Blauvelt. Music: Rob Mazurek. Distributors: MACO Cine and MUBI. Duration: 110 minutes. Rooms (first week): 23 (Cinemark Palermo, Cinépolis Recoleta, Cinépolis Houssay, Showcase Belgrano, Multiplex Belgrano, Atlas Caballlito, Atlas Patio Bullrich, Cinema Devoto, Lorca, Cine Arte Cacodelphia, Hoyts Unicenter, Showcase Norcenter, Cinépolis Pilar, Multiplex Pilar, Cinema Paradiso de La Plata, Cinépolis Rosario, Showcase Rosario, Cinemas del Centro de Rosario, Showcase Córdoba, Cinemacenter Córdoba, Cinemark Mendoza, Cinépolis Mendoza Shopping and Cinemacenter Mendoza).

VIDEO REVIEW, by Manu Yáñez and Diego Batlle

INTERVIEW

Here is a talk by Diego Batlle with Kelly Reichardt about this film

CRITICISM

As a combination between the spirit of the cinema of Jean-Pierre Melville and Sidney Lumet, the tone of Golden City / Fat City (1972), by John Huston, and the look of The American friend (1977), by Wim Wenders (Robby Müller has always been an influence on the director), this new film by Kelly Reichardt could be seen, although – being a director who has “betrayed” other classic genres such as the western – no one expects this story about a theft of paintings in a museum to go along the usual lines. However, Mastermind It can be seen as a film that recovers the spirit of seventies cinema (perhaps the last golden age of Hollywood cinema) and connects certain issues such as the Vietnam War with current paranoia and repression.

The perfect antihero conceived by Reichardt is JB Mooney (Josh O’Connor, impeccable for a character with several similarities to that of The maltby Alice Rohrwacher), a man who lives in a small Massachusetts town with his wife Terri (Alana Haim) and their sons Tommy (Jasper Thompson) and Carl (Sterling Thompson). After an initial scene in which they test the security vulnerabilities of the Framingham Art Museum (at that time there were very few guards and no cameras were installed), this “Mastermind” plans a coup and hires his collaborators to steal four works by the abstract painter Arthur Dove. The plan initially goes reasonably well, but that is only the beginning of a series of misadventures and drifts, since there will be betrayals, police investigations, escapes, road movie moments and the feeling that – although he receives some help – no one cares too much about JB’s misfortunes.

With images far from “perfection” and those saturated colors that prevail in contemporary cinema (another great collaboration with his usual director of photography Christopher Blauvelt), with jazz music à la John Coltrane and/or Bill Evans, but with a lot of percussion in the background (there is something of jazz in the way the film deviates permanently) and with an extraordinary ending that gives meaning without fall into moralizing everything seen until then, While teacher It is another example of the talent and multiple facets of a filmmaker who never stops experimenting and, luckily, surprising.