A remarkably original experience, mainly takes the form of a silent film, as both protagonists - two children fifty years apart - are deaf. Brian Selznick's screenplay (based on his own novel) cross cuts young Oakes Fegley in 1977 as he runs away to find his father, with another journey in 1925 by Millie Simmonds (her debut) both of them ending up in New York. The two young leads are good.
Feelings of deafness well caught, with sound sometimes disappearing - Millie's parents are vile and often angry; she finds solace with her older brother. Her realization in the cinema that sound is coming - it will mark the end of her cinema days. The ending, taking place at the New York Panorama, an amazing model built in 1964, is wonderful.
Great production design here (and a load of CGI by Framestore and others) in the creations of a distinctly run down and dodgy seventies city and a rather more glamorous black and white twenties one: Mark Friedberg (since the 1980s, recently Joker and If Beale Street Could Talk).
Jaden Michael befriends the boy in 1977. Haynes favourite Julianne Moore has a double role.
Music (of which there is plenty, and featuring much use of silent style percussive instruments) by Carter Burwell, edited by Affonso Goncalves, DP Ed Lachman.
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