The Vast of Night

    The Vast of Night
    2019

    Synopsis

    At the dawn of the space-race, two radio-obsessed teens discover a strange frequency over the airwaves in what becomes the most important night of their lives and in the history of their small town.

    Your Movie Library

    Cast

    • Sierra McCormickFay Crocker
    • Jake HorowitzEverett
    • Bruce DavisBilly (voice)
    • Gail CronauerMabel Blanche
    • Cheyenne BartonBertsie
    • Mark BanikGerald
    • Gregory PeytonBenny Wade
    • Adam DietrichRodkey Oliver
    • Mallorie RodakSusan Oliver
    • Mollie MilliganMarjorie Seward

    Recommendations

    • 100

      Variety

      Patterson trusts that chemistry will compensate for a gentle thriller that chooses to impress with ingenuity and charm instead of special effects.
    • 100

      RogerEbert.com

      How on earth Patterson made a movie about a UFO hovering over a small town in the late 1950s without falling back on every cliche in the book is the fun and wonder of The Vast of Night. You already know the plot. You've seen it all before. But the way the story is told is new. With The Vast of Night, it really is about the how, not just the "what happens."
    • 100

      The Playlist

      While it nods to everything from ‘The Twilight Zone’ to ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind,’ Patterson’s movie is more a tribute to the romance of a breeze-whispered sprawling night and the shivery thrill of not knowing what nameless threats it hides.
    • 100

      San Francisco Chronicle

      Using long takes, tracking shots, segments where the screen goes pitch-black, and rapid-fire, overlapping dialogue, Patterson has created a film that forces an audience to pay attention for fear of missing something.
    • 83

      The A.V. Club

      It’s impressive to see such sophisticated camera work from a newcomer. But to combine that with experimental narrative and sound techniques, and place it in a detailed mid-century modern environment, and to have all these ambitious gambits (mostly) work, all on an independent film budget...well, it’s quite the feat.
    • 80

      Slashfilm

      Like the characters that are drawn to the peculiar sound and dark sky on that fateful evening, The Vast of Night is a film that lures the audience’s attention to the screen and will leave you wanting more films from Patterson down the road.
    • 75

      LarsenOnFilm

      It’s less Close Encounters of the Third Kind and more like a special episode of The Twilight Zone, starring The X-Files’ Mulder and Scully. Which is to say, pretty fun.
    • 75

      Slant Magazine

      Director AndrePatterson never breaks the film's incantatory spell with pointless freneticism, patiently savoring the great thrill of genre stories: anticipation.

    Seen by

    • ghostradio