MoMA Contenders 2025: The Mastermind
Tue 12/16 • 7:30PM PST
Hammer Museum
Understated auteur Kelly Reichardt's return to more suspenseful genre fare since Night Moves (2013) is The Mastermind, an art heist-turned-character portrait of a Massachusetts father inching closer to the fringes. A frequent visitor to the sleepy Framingham Museum of Art with his wife and kids, out-of-work architect JB Mooney (Josh O'Connor), enlists a shaggy group of local crooks to swipe a few Arthur Dove paintings from the galleries in broad daylight. As the investigation into the robbery begins, Mooney starts to unravel. Set in 1970, Reichardt skillfully uses an America upended by the Vietnam War and transformed by the Civil Rights Movement as a backdrop for the frenzied and desperate Mooney to stay out of the hands of the authorities. Underpinned by stellar performances from the ensemble, including Hope Davis, Bill Camp, Alana Haim, Gaby Hoffman, and John Magaro, The Mastermind is an exemplary Reichardt film with a richly intimate and flawed world, populated by even more textured characters.
2025. USA. Written and directed by Kelly Reichardt. With Josh O’Connor, Alana Haim, Hope Davis. DCP courtesy MUBI. 110 min.
Learn more: https://hmmr.buzz/mastermind
Tickets
$10 Hammer members | $20 general admission
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