Powerful
House of Sand and Fog (2003)
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Reviews Counted:166
Fresh:125
Rotten:41
Average Rating:7.1/10
Consensus: Powerful and thought provoking film.
Rated: R [See Full Rating] for some violence/disturbing images, language and a scene of sexuality
Runtime: 2 hrs 6 mins
Genre: Dramas
Theatrical Release:Dec 19, 2003 Limited
Box Office: $12,924,917
Synopsis: Ben Kingsley and Jennifer Connelly star in the powerful drama HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG as two people fighting over the same house. Connelly is Kathy, a troubled young woman struggling with addiction... Ben Kingsley and Jennifer Connelly star in the powerful drama HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG as two people fighting over the same house. Connelly is Kathy, a troubled young woman struggling with addiction and her husband's departure. Lost in her funk, she fails to check her mail, which includes letters threatening to evict her. After she is thrown out of the house she grew up in--wrongly, it turns out, so she seeks legal representation--Massoud Amir Behrani (Kingsley) buys the property at auction with the goal of selling it at a huge profit so his family can live a better life. Behrani, a former colonel in the Iranian army, is determined to make his family's move to the United States a successful one--nothing matters more to him than his wife and son's well-being. But when he sees Kathy sleeping in a car outside his fence, he knows he is in for a fight. Based on the book by Andre Dubus III, Vadim Perelman's directorial debut is a fascinating study of family in the United States. Kathy has no one to turn to--her father is dead, her husband has abandoned her, and she's too frightened to seek help from her mother or brother. She falls for Lester (Ron Eldard), a deputy sheriff who claims to no longer love his wife. And Behrani is so dedicated to his wife (Shohreh Aghidashloo in a riveting performance) and son (Jonahtan Ahdout) that he blinds himself to Kathy's dire situation. HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG is a relentless, thought-provoking work that will linger with audiences long after the film ends. [More]
Starring: Ben Kingsley, Jennifer Connelly, Ron Eldard, Jonathan Ahdout
Starring: Ben Kingsley, Jennifer Connelly, Ron Eldard, Jonathan Ahdout, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Frances Fisher, Kim Dickens, Navi Rawat
Director: Vadim Perelman
Director: Vadim Perelman
Screenwriter: Vadim Perelman, Shawn Otto
Producer: Michael London, Vadim Perelman
Composer: James Horner
Studio: DreamWorks Distribution LLC
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Reviews for House of Sand and Fog
...cannot fault the fine craftwork done both in front of and behind the camera. Kingsley is on my short list for best actor.
Gripping, intense and profoundly unsettling, House of Sand and Fog deserves a prime spot at the top of everybody's must-see list.
An engrossing drama about the downward mobility of a recovering alcoholic and the yearning for upward mobility of an Iranian immigrant.
A vigorous and bracingly acted melodrama spun off from a situation that's pure human-thriller catnip.
Russian born Perelman has given ... more fully to the foreigner..., but the universal desire for land ownership has never been more lamentably depicted.
Could have been even more compelling with a less heavy-handed approach to the material.
A poignant presentation of the unanswerable question...can America, and Americans, live up to the ideals (and ideologies) it sets for itself?
The war between America and the Middle East is in full metaphoric force in Vadim Perelman’s ridiculous eviction melodrama House of Sand and Fog.
A brilliant treatise on people who do all the wrong things for all the right reasons.
Lack of sympathy for the beautiful but flaky heroine undermines the dramatic framework of "House" like a swarm of hungry termites.
Jennifer Connelly nails her performance, keenly displaying the self-destruction of a woman grasping for anything that might take things back to the way they used to be.
It's a devastating portrait of smart, civilized people driven to behave in uncivilized ways, until it's too late.
Kingsley (Gandhi) and Connelly (A Beautiful Mind) both give magnetic, heartbreaking performances.
The carefully laid foundation of suspense and dread, with its symmetries and crisp dialogue, is squandered in a clumsy pileup of credulity-stretching cataclysmic events.
Latest News for House of Sand and Fog
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March 17, 2003:
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