Meet Hal (Christopher Plummer), his son Oliver (Ewan McGregor), and Oliver's new girlfriend Anna (Melanie Laurent), they are all beginners. In what? In matters of Love and Life.
Beginners, Mike Mills' second feature-length film, is a movie about the importance of the choices one makes to fill life with joy, rather than sadness. It tells three stories in three different time lines, interwoven with each other. The red thread that links each story is Oliver, a 38-year old artist. Through his eyes and voice (and the use of some clever graphics by the director), we go back and forth in time: we are shown glimpses of Oliver's Mom and her unhappy marriage with Hal, a museum director and a closeted gay in a society that considers homosexuality an illness in desperate need of a cure; after his wife's death, 75-year old Hal decides to begin a new life, we see him finally embracing his homosexuality freely and unabashedly; the third story is about Oliver himself: few months after his father's death, still mourning for his loss, he meets Anna, a French actress, at a costume party. It is a particular moment in Oliver's life, he's trying to make sense of his own past, his own present, and decide which shape to give to his own future.
At the centre of the movie is the idea that is never too late to come out of the proverbial closet and try (more or less successfully) to be happy in Life. But the film is not just about being gay (or not), that is just one thread in the movie. The closet here is extended figuratively to all those people who for reasons often unknown, perhaps fear of failure or fear of being hurt, live lives of emotional dullness and never commit to anyone.
One could easily describe Beginners as a light-hearted feel-good-movie with some kind of happy ending attached to it, but that would be a far too narrow definition, somehow limiting the film's scope and quality. This isn't really a comedy. On the other hand, this is not a tragedy. Throughout its length Beginners remains always conscious of what it is not. Mills and his cast are wise enough to never attempt to turn the movie in some sort of philosophical treatise about the film's subject matter, so they never make the mistake to take themselves too seriously, at the same time, keeping a good balance between laughter and sadness, and staying at arm length from the pitfalls and clichés of the gay-genre, the movie never undermines its core cinematic value. Notwithstanding the film's general release coinciding with the week preceding the Gay-Pride celebrations, it is not among the aims of Beginners to attempt to stir any kind of new social debate on gay-rights, integration and, further on, the death of creativity in capitalist-societies. True, the plot touches upon these many important themes, but it does it with a consistent and uplifting lightness of touch. Overall, I consider Mike Mill's Beginners a delicate and charming, at times poetic, here and there quite funny speculation on life, love, and the hard matter of human relationships. It deals often with tragic matters, but thanks to its tone, acting, graphic choices and direction, not to mention a solid script, while asking some interesting questions the film ends up putting a smile on our faces, albeit at times that smile has the bittersweet taste that is proper of life.
The acting never looks adrift. The overall atmosphere is light and melancholic; the mood in the scenes about Oliver and Anna reminded me of the best bits in Lost in Translation. McGregor and Laurent are well cast and show good chemistry. Mary Page Keller as Georgia is excellent. Christopher Plummer is at his best, not far from the heights of Ian McKellan's Jimmy Whale in Gods and Monster and Peter O'Toole's Maurice in Venus.
Browsing the movie's website, I read the story is inspired by the director's own family history. Mills' father, himself a museum director, followed a path similar to Hal's. Perhaps the close understanding of the subject lends to Mill's writing and direction even more assurance. In the wrong hands this movie could have easily been excessively light or excessively sad and boring, instead Mike Mill's skills and an excellent ensemble of well cast actors make Beginners a truly enjoyable experience, a movie definitely worth watching.
We all live in some sort of closet. Some of us never get out of it and, like in that famous video by The Cure, end up down a cliff. Others, like Hal, Oliver and Anna are brave enough to break its doors and set themselves free. It is never too late to try.
Beginners is perhaps far from being an instant classic, nonetheless, in this Summer full of brainless blockbusters, this is definitely a movie worth watching.
Beginners, Mike Mills' second feature-length film, is a movie about the importance of the choices one makes to fill life with joy, rather than sadness. It tells three stories in three different time lines, interwoven with each other. The red thread that links each story is Oliver, a 38-year old artist. Through his eyes and voice (and the use of some clever graphics by the director), we go back and forth in time: we are shown glimpses of Oliver's Mom and her unhappy marriage with Hal, a museum director and a closeted gay in a society that considers homosexuality an illness in desperate need of a cure; after his wife's death, 75-year old Hal decides to begin a new life, we see him finally embracing his homosexuality freely and unabashedly; the third story is about Oliver himself: few months after his father's death, still mourning for his loss, he meets Anna, a French actress, at a costume party. It is a particular moment in Oliver's life, he's trying to make sense of his own past, his own present, and decide which shape to give to his own future.
At the centre of the movie is the idea that is never too late to come out of the proverbial closet and try (more or less successfully) to be happy in Life. But the film is not just about being gay (or not), that is just one thread in the movie. The closet here is extended figuratively to all those people who for reasons often unknown, perhaps fear of failure or fear of being hurt, live lives of emotional dullness and never commit to anyone.
One could easily describe Beginners as a light-hearted feel-good-movie with some kind of happy ending attached to it, but that would be a far too narrow definition, somehow limiting the film's scope and quality. This isn't really a comedy. On the other hand, this is not a tragedy. Throughout its length Beginners remains always conscious of what it is not. Mills and his cast are wise enough to never attempt to turn the movie in some sort of philosophical treatise about the film's subject matter, so they never make the mistake to take themselves too seriously, at the same time, keeping a good balance between laughter and sadness, and staying at arm length from the pitfalls and clichés of the gay-genre, the movie never undermines its core cinematic value. Notwithstanding the film's general release coinciding with the week preceding the Gay-Pride celebrations, it is not among the aims of Beginners to attempt to stir any kind of new social debate on gay-rights, integration and, further on, the death of creativity in capitalist-societies. True, the plot touches upon these many important themes, but it does it with a consistent and uplifting lightness of touch. Overall, I consider Mike Mill's Beginners a delicate and charming, at times poetic, here and there quite funny speculation on life, love, and the hard matter of human relationships. It deals often with tragic matters, but thanks to its tone, acting, graphic choices and direction, not to mention a solid script, while asking some interesting questions the film ends up putting a smile on our faces, albeit at times that smile has the bittersweet taste that is proper of life.
The acting never looks adrift. The overall atmosphere is light and melancholic; the mood in the scenes about Oliver and Anna reminded me of the best bits in Lost in Translation. McGregor and Laurent are well cast and show good chemistry. Mary Page Keller as Georgia is excellent. Christopher Plummer is at his best, not far from the heights of Ian McKellan's Jimmy Whale in Gods and Monster and Peter O'Toole's Maurice in Venus.
Browsing the movie's website, I read the story is inspired by the director's own family history. Mills' father, himself a museum director, followed a path similar to Hal's. Perhaps the close understanding of the subject lends to Mill's writing and direction even more assurance. In the wrong hands this movie could have easily been excessively light or excessively sad and boring, instead Mike Mill's skills and an excellent ensemble of well cast actors make Beginners a truly enjoyable experience, a movie definitely worth watching.
We all live in some sort of closet. Some of us never get out of it and, like in that famous video by The Cure, end up down a cliff. Others, like Hal, Oliver and Anna are brave enough to break its doors and set themselves free. It is never too late to try.
Beginners is perhaps far from being an instant classic, nonetheless, in this Summer full of brainless blockbusters, this is definitely a movie worth watching.