This was great for the first hour or so and there are absolutely fantastic performances present from Michael Shannon, Carla Gugino and Taylor John Smith - the latter in what could be a starmaking performance. There are definite veins of Whiplash in the DNA but the movie succumbs to genre conventions in the second half and a lot of the developments and character interactions start to make little sense. Still though, it's very polished and well-made. B-