Chicago, 1993. At his 23 years-old, James Fray is a lost soul stuck in a spiral of auto-destruction due to his addiction to drugs and alcohol. After a night of partying, James accidentally falls off the balcony of the house where he was staying, breaking his nose. When he comes to from his alcohol and drug-fueled high hours later, he finds himself on an airplane headed to Minnesota, to be admitted in Hazelden Foundation, a legendary rehab center for addicts. Reluctant to take... (Full plot summary below)
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Chicago, 1993. At his 23 years-old, James Fray is a lost soul stuck in a spiral of auto-destruction due to his addiction to drugs and alcohol. After a night of partying, James accidentally falls off the balcony of the house where he was staying, breaking his nose. When he comes to from his alcohol and drug-fueled high hours later, he finds himself on an airplane headed to Minnesota, to be admitted in Hazelden Foundation, a legendary rehab center for addicts. Reluctant to take any step to address his addictions, in the center he meets other patients in treatment: Leonard, a foul-mouthed former member of the mob; John, a deranged sexual obsessive unable to contain his primary impulses; Roy, a bipolar disorder combined with religious delirium; and finally Miles, a clarinet player and former judge who turns on his roommate. Despite the rules of the center that prevent all contact between men and women, who are treated in different pavilions of the center, James meets Lilly, a beautiful and fragile young girl with a serious problem of addiction and emotional dependence. Watched by the center's staff, supervisor Lincoln and psychologist Joanne, James starts to think about the life he lived and the events of his past at the same time he is visited by his older brother Bob Jr., a man frustrated by his younger brother's addiction, in an attempt to redirect him. While James finds in Leonard a supporter and friend to start his recovery, he and Lilly meet in secret, falling in love each other. However, when their meetings are discovered by Lincoln and Joanne, James finds himself not only fearing by Lilly's life, but at a crossroads where every decision could change his life forever.
Leave your thoughts about A Million Little Pieces.
| Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperAs a stand-alone work of cinema fiction, A Million Little Pieces is an effective blunt instrument of a film — a rough-edged, unvarnished, painfully accurate portrayal of addiction and rehabilitation. |
| Total FilmJames MottramPowered by the magnetic Aaron Taylor-Johnson, it’s rough around the edges, but still intoxicating. |
| The A.V. ClubMike D'AngeloThe movie version plays exactly like every other rehab-facility melodrama ever made. Even the stuff that Frey invented seems overly familiar, borrowed from sources ranging from "28 Days" to (somewhat improbably — people in recovery aren’t necessarily allowed dental anesthetic, it turns out) "Marathon Man." |
| The TelegraphTim RobeyThe film’s sincere core is threatened a little by its flashier directorial effects. |
| New York PostJohnny Oleksinski“Pieces” becomes just like every other addiction film, relying on colorful addict characters and torture-porn scenes to arrive at a hopeful end. |
| New York Magazine (Vulture)Alison WillmoreThe result is an underwhelming addiction story that feels not just familiar, but more focused on the bad-boy swagger of its main character than his actual recovery. |
| TheWrapMichael NordineAs a film, the biggest issue with A Million Little Pieces isn’t whether any of this happened; it’s that, even if it did, none of it stands out from the many similar movies that came before it. |
| EmpireAlex GodfreyIt’s well-intentioned and pretty, but not much else. Occasional stylistic flourish aside, it offers nothing we haven’t seen before, buckling under the weight of its own conservatism. |
| The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisAnother ruin-and-rehab tale, one that initially tantalizes then flatly disappoints. |
| We Got This CoveredLuke ParkerWhile its well-founded intentions and creative intuitions are palpable, not even a tortuously acrobatic performance from Aaron Taylor-Johnson saves A Million Little Pieces from consistently sober storytelling. |
