(Annette
Bening)
A film that is deliciously watchable. (Review:
Patrick Compton - 8/10)
Your attitude towards this quirky,
independent film may depend on whether you would have liked to have lived in
the crumbling California mansion of 50-something Dorothea (Annette Bening) in
the late 1970s.
I have to confess that I would have been
delighted to have spent time with her, her son Jamie (Lucas Jade Zumann) and
her three boarders Abbey (Greta Gerwig), Julie (Elle Fanning) and William
(Billy Crudup), particularly if I had been young and “happening” at the time.
Based upon the memories of writer-director
Mike Mills as an adolescent, 20th Century
Women is at once witty, charming and moving as Dorothea narrates her
bohemian life as a single mother, both struggling to understand her son and his
generation, as well as making room for herself in this vibrant, puzzling world
that subsists on shifting foundations.
This is not a movie with an obvious plot,
and it doesn’t try to be about anything in particular – except that it’s about
everything. If that sounds like a contradiction in terms, watching this movie
will enable you to understand exactly what I mean.
We get to know and like this “family” from
the get-go. Abbey, who is recovering from cancer, is a keen photographer with a
New Wave haircut; Julie is the object of Jamie’s affections but she consents to
sleep in his bed on the condition that they remain friends only. William, who
is engaged in helping Dorothea to renovate her shambling house, is a handsome
mechanic and handyman who is happy to receive women in his orbit but doesn’t
know what to do with them once they’ve arrived. Jamie, all of 15, is precocious
but still learning about himself and his world. Typically, he doesn’t always
respond warmly to his concerned mother’s interventions in his life.
This is a very talky film, and the chat is
fluent, chippy and all-embracing. Every subject under the sun is up for grabs
but the overall flow is about Dorothea who is determined to bring up Jamie as a
moral being, but finds that the older he gets, the less she knows him.
Mills structures the film ingeniously,
using flashbacks, quotes from famous writers and a musical and fashion menu
that includes something of a clash between Dorothea’s preferred tastes (Louis
Armstrong, Glenn Miller) and the music of the period (late punk).
All the performances are terrific, but
ultimately this is Bening’s show as she puzzles how to bring her son up to be
happier than she was. We identify completely with her warm, tousled appearance,
her laconic remarks, wisdom and vulnerability. We relate to her, not just when
she is talking, but even more so when she is listening and silently responding
to the sometimes provocative mouthings of the youthful folk around her.
This film’s questions are, of course, more
pertinent than the answers (because there are no definitive answers) as Mills
creates his attractively-peopled world. More than anything, however, this is a
film that is deliciously watchable.
20th
Century Women opened at Cinema Nouveau, Gateway, on
May 12. – Patrick Compton
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