Movie Review: ‘Roofman’ offers great acting, comic relief and a true story

Of all the crazy things to happen in 2025 so far, was anybody expecting two filmmakers with reputations for being melodramatic– Darren Aronofsky and Derek Cianfrance — to branch out of their comfort zones and direct light-hearted films set in the late 1990s with a lot of comic relief?

Last month it was Aronofsky with Caught Stealing, and now Cianfrance gives us Roofman. Inspired by real incidents throughout North Carolina, Roofman is now one of my favorite movies of the year.

In late 1998, Jeffrey Manchester (Channing Tatum) is a divorced dad with a military background who is unemployed and can barely afford his kids’ birthday presents. Despite his failures, Jeff is very good on his feet and can come up with a plan and execute it very quickly — such as breaking into McDonald’s and stealing from the register to make up for his mistakes to his family.

But when he’s busted for a kidnapping along with a robbery and sent to prison, Jeff successfully breaks out and secretly begins living in the ceiling of a Toys “R” Us outside Charlotte, NC. Things take an unexpected turn when he becomes friendly with one of the store’s employees, single mom Leigh Wainscott (Kirsten Dunst), who is active in the choir and toy drive of the town’s Presbyterian church.

LaKeith Stanfield, Peter Dinklage, Emory Cohen, Juno Temple, Melonie Diaz, Ben Mendelsohn and Jimmy O. Yang are some of the recognizable faces in the supporting cast. Roofman was co-written by Cianfrance and Kirt Gunn, and is the director’s return to the big screen following his HBO mini-series “I Know This Much is True” (2020).

Besides being an funny and charming comedy-drama, the new picture also counters Kogonada’s A Big, Bold, Beautiful Journey in reminding us that product placement incorporated into a plot can be easily forgiven, or at least less distracting, if the story and final product are good enough. Though lighter in tone than his usual projects, Roofman does still have the cinematic DNA Cianfrance is known for, and it works well with a fairly modest story.

Tatum remains one of the best leading men of his generation and Dunst, a lifelong favorite actress of mine, delivers the best performance in the movie, even making me cry during a scene near the end. If spooky films aren’t your thing during October, Roofman gets a recommendation from me this month.