Film Review: Another Year

I really didn't put in enough effort to see this movie before writing up my "Best of 2010" list in January. There are only a few films that really deserve that sort of extra effort, or that warrant an extensive trip to see. I haven't exactly been a follower of director Mike Leigh, having ditched out of an attempt to see Happy-Go-Lucky at the last minute. He certainly isn't a household name, even if he has earned it with a track record more flawless than Christopher Nolan's. I've been saying before that the only reason Another Year wasn't nominated for Best Picture this year was because it missed out on the final rush of nominations voting, given its late release date. I can't quite say that to be true now, because in a society that is currently inexorably rotating around The King's Speech, it baffles me that this could go unnoticed.

I can see why audiences don't find immediate appeal in it. That can be summed up in a simple synopsis: It's about old people. In each of the Best Picture nominated films this year, the protagonist is of reasonable age. The closest we get to old is with Annette Bening in The Kids Are All Right, and they don't quite milk that for all that it's worth, do they? Even more than the characters, the central theme of Another Year is being old or growing older. The opening scene of the film, which could strike some viewers as being peculiar, shows a hopelessly depressed female insomniac, not ready to tell a psychiatrist about her family life. On a scale from 1 to 10, she's at a 1.

You see this character in very stark contrast to the other characters in the film at this time. There's Tom and Geri, two very happily married people, their positive son Joe, and their seemingly perky-as-bright-sunshine friend Mary. What could there possibly be to be so upset and depressed about. The film takes place in four acts, and the first act ends with a reveal of what kind of person Mary is. She drinks a lot, is very much in denial about her level of happiness, and her emotions are wild in frantic. She's a bit of a slut, thinking of a possibility with nearly every man she meets. You get to thinking, why are Tom and Geri even friends with her? She's that sort of friend that you're stuck with, and you very much don't want to just get rid of them. That would be just too cruel.

The other three acts build upon the feeling of melancholy set up by the first act, introducing Tom's friend Ken, a person very much like Mary, brutally beaten and defeated by life's cruelty, drinking his troubles away. Things don't get better as you get older, and that's a fact the youth of our world don't quite accept. The third act focuses very entirely on Mary, showing her sinking to her lowest depths emotionally and morally. That's probably the point in which the audience most despises her, and you can't really blame yourself for it. She's become the sort of burden you just want to rid yourself of.

The final act of the film is almost unbearable to watch, and it turns almost everything around. You wonder across the entirety of that act if the film is just going to end in a split-second, and it keeps you in rapt attention. It has to, because it brings you down to your knees emotionally, and it affects you in a way I never imagined any film could. I can't remember that I've ever been this seismically affected by a film in my life. You can ally that to many different aspects of the production, notably the performances. Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen give a solid rock that the audience relates to so easily throughout the film, while Lesley Manville is a more immense force of reckoning. Over the film, I was having trouble pegging her as either a lead or supporting actress, and by the end, hers is the character you remember most vibrantly.

There are plenty more talents that provide something powerful to this feature, with Imelda Staunton playing the insomniac at the start of the film, Peter Wight playing the overweight drunk Ken, and Oliver Maltman playing Tom and Geri's son Joe. The supporting actor that truly stole the show for me was David Bradley as Tom's brother Ronnie. When you see the film, you will get what I so totally love about his performance. The cinematography of the piece of so vibrant and affecting, not just in the use of camera angle, but in the way they light each scene so meticulously. It's marvelous. The film varies from exuberant happiness and moments of light comedic value to such hopeless depression. It's an awkward experience for all involved, but not at all in the wrong way. By the end of the decade, however far away that may be, I hope that Another Year is remembered as one of the greats.

A