Coming up on The Culture Section: The review for the much-anticipated The King's Speech. In the mean time, here's a review of Colin Firth's last Ocsar-botherer, A Single Man.
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
1962, America: English professor George (Colin Firth) wakes one morning to the decision that he is going to kill himself at the end of the day; his life seemingly means nothing since the death of his long-term partner Jim (Matthew Goode). He spends the rest of the day taking everything around him in, whilst reliving painful memories of the past...
It is without question that this is the film which Colin Firth SHOULD have won an Oscar for in 2010. His performance virtually carries the movie out of a slightly arty, perhaps pretentious mawkishness and fills it with humanity.
That's not to be so incredibly harsh of the film; it is certainly beautiful to look at, first-time director Tom Ford very aware (perhaps a little too much) of colour and light in his world. In particular, emphasis is placed heavily on clothes. In one scene where George is sitting at a bank when a neighbour's daughter steps forward to speak to him, the camera pans up her body, showing off her blue dress in spectacular fashion.
The script, adapted from a novel by Christopher Isherwood, is perfectly fine up to a point. George is in every single scene, which certainly helps. Lesser characters are not as important as this single man, though there is perhaps a little predictability within some of the scenes, not least the ones featuring Nicholas Hoult as one of George's students. Both endings feel a little predictable too, though you do need to be paying attention to the early stages of the film in order to get it.
The day pans out fairly quickly, which is by no means a bad thing. It would perhaps have been a little more interesting to have seen more of George's teaching of his students. What is refreshing is that, for a film that is about a gay man, there is no struggle for George to be accepted; it is only hinted at about unseen characters - firstly one of his neighbours, secondly the parents of his late partner JIm, who decide to hold the funeral for "family only".
But this is truly Firth's film. Though there is a nice little mini-scene with Julianne Moore as a friend of George's going through her own personal mid-life crisis, her accent superb and flawless, without Firth's quiet desperation the scene would just seem out of place. There is as much humour in his performance as there is sadness. The scene where George finds out about Jim's death in particular stands out as a feat of epic acting skills, a brilliant school for all aspiring actors to watch with unwavering eyes.
Perhaps, ironically, A Single Man is just about that - a single man who can carry an entire story, an entire film on his shoulders with seamless ease.
7/10
Trailer:
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