“Take Shelter”: Visually Stunning, but Ultimately Fatally Flawed, Plot-wise

When family man Curtis from rural Ohio starts to have disturbing visions of an impending apocalypse, he has to make a decision: Prepare for the end of the world or seek help from a psychiatrist. In a way, he does both: He starts to fix up the old storm shelter in his backyard, an endeavor for which he ends up risking both his job and his marriage; but as his nightmares begin to seep into his waking life and the people around him grow increasingly concerned about his erratic behavior, he has to seriously ask himself if what he is facing is not the end of days, but rather the early days of a mental illness that runs in his family.
This elegiacally shot film by writer-director Jeff Nichols lives from two things: One, the visually absolutely stunning cinematography depicting rural life just as impressively as the protagonist's increasingly terrifying yet beautiful nature-related visions. We see pastoral wide shots of the family's back yard and the fields behind it that seem to stretch out up to the faraway horizon. Not only does this take your breath away in the same way an impressive painting in a gallery might, it also conveys the apparently free country life that can be suffocating at the same time because of its literal and figurative emptiness. Curtis's visions provide a welcome break: Yellow, oil-like rain starts to fall and lightning covers the entire sky – phenomenons that are scary in themselves, but become even more so when Curtis realizes he seems to be the only one noticing them.
The second strong suit of the film is the tour-de-force performance of Michael Shannon in the lead role as a truly torn man who feels he has a mission on which his family's lives depends while having to satisfy the demands of a society who regards that mission as insane. He goes back and forth between thinking himself a prophet and a madman; and both options become increasingly terrifying. Over the course of the film, Shannon dials up the dread in a subtle but striking way. When things come to a climax as Curtis believes the end of the world to arrive, he appears to become a threat to his family instead of protecting them, which had been his goal all along. He seems to be aware of this discrepancy, and yet, he can't help himself. By trying to save his wife and kid, he runs the risk of destroying their family bond. Shannon portrays this compulsive behavior in a beautifully restrained way: Instead of wide-eyed lunatic, he becomes tormented caregiver.
Where “Take Shelter” runs into its biggest problem, however, is in deciding what it ultimately wants to be (possible spoilers ahead): A mystery that keeps us guessing if this character's visions are real – or the psychological profile of a man that is slowly falling apart due to mental illness.
As a mystery, it fails: It is much too slow and artsy to keep suspense junkies on the edge of their seats. But more importantly, it doesn't really give us the impression it is even trying to be a mystery. Rather, all clues throughout the story point in the same direction: that Curtis is mentally ill. There is not much here that keeps you guessing.
But the film's real downfall, and the reason why it doesn't work as a psychological study either, is its final scene. All the clues given to the viewer are suddenly done away with in favor of a resolution that all but contradicts the trajectory of the entire previous narrative. Unless the last scene is regarded as another delusion (and according to interviews with the filmmaker and actors, it is not intended that way), it makes you feel cheated and deceived after following the plot along for two hours. Sadly, all the beautiful thunderstorms in the world won't make you walk out of this film completely satisfied.