Dark Matter (2008)

Image credit: Matthew Margolin

DARK MATTER Meryl Streep in this film about a Chinese student who spirals into darkness at a U.S. university

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Liu Xing (Liu Ye) is a brilliant Chinese student who's recently arrived at an American university, where things go good, then bad, then — totally out of nowhere — really bad. It helps to know that Dark Matter is based on a real-life situation that ended violently. Otherwise, its climax is likely to garner where'd-that-come-from snorts instead of the hoped-for gut punch. But either way, Liu Ye is too inexpressive for his role's demands, and the movie doesn't build to his downfall: It just zaps itself there. C-