The following review makes reference to the 2017 film The Vanishing of Sidney Hall, and does not contain spoilers of any type.

Year: 2017 Category: Mystery, Drama. Director: Shawn Christensen. Cast: Logan Lerman, Elle Fanning, Blake Jenner, Michelle Monaghan, Kyle Chandler, Nathan Lane, Margaret Qualley, Tim Blake Nelson, Fredi Walker-Browne, Sasha Hutchings.

After publishing a best seller the controversial writer Sidney Hall is unexpectedly catapulted to fame. His relationship with his girlfriend begins to collapse as a result of the book and he disappears. Ten years later an enigmatic detective decides to look for him throughout the country.

The film tells the story of Sidney Hall a young man with an undeniable talent for writing, his only problem is the subjects he chooses to do, since other people are inappropriate. He writes everything in his diary, does not use the Internet, and even prefers to use a typewriter instead of a computer. His best and perhaps only friend is Duane Jones, one of his teachers, who supports Sidney in his writings.

Sidney lives with his disabled father Gerald, and his mother, who intrudes into his life. Soon Sidney will also meet Melody, the beautiful girl who lives in the house across the street, and who likes to read so she admires the writings that Sidney does, who is considered by all as an honest writer.

Things start to get complicated when Brett Newport, one of the students at the school, a football player with whom Sidney does not have a good relationship, and who is the son of Judge George Newport, asks him to help find a box that was buried by both when they were children.

Thus we see several time lines, of which three can be identified: the first, in which Sidney meets Melody, seeks the box with Brett, and confronts his personal problems; in the second timeline we see a successful Sidney Hall after he has managed to publish his novel "Suburban Tragedy" which has been a best seller and is described as a great work, however, this generates problems in his life personal; finally we see a third line of time in which a detective investigating the burning of books in different libraries in the country, and the one who is doing it is Sidney Hall, who is missing.

The first few minutes entertained me a lot, but then the film declines, however, not enough to want to stop watching the movie.

The direction is acceptable, Shawn Christensen, who is not only the director but also the scriptwriter, he does well in general lines, although I think he has several flaws, the first of which is improperly using the division of the temporal lines, and in second place, the fact of not providing the characters with sufficient depth.

The performances are generally good, Logan Lerman seems to have his own audience, although I'm not there, I do not understand the reason but this actor does not convince me, the films I saw in which he acts, which are not many, I could never empathize with his characters, however his interpretation is not necessarily bad, does an acceptable job. Elle Fanning is great, the character seems created specifically for her, so everything she does looks very natural and conveys all her personal charm on the screen, lovely. Michelle Monaghan really does not have a very big role here, her screen time is less than we would want but she does it well. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Kyle Chandler do very well too, and the rest are the acceptable Blake Jenner, a good Nathan Lane, and a Margaret Qualley who has a rising career.

The film talks about feelings, about secrets kept for a long time, secrets that hurt, guilt, pain, missed opportunities, everything that could be and was not, the influence and repercussions of the acts we do, love, deception, and even the family, the success with which it does depends exclusively on the viewer, personally I think the film has some precise flaws but not for them should be sacrificed all the work.

Direction and script regularly acceptable, good performances, and an interesting story but with some technical failures.