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A Single Man (M, 94min) Directed by Tom Ford *****
George Falconer (Colin Firth) was never one to jump out of bed and greet the day, but lately waking up has actually hurt.
That’s because his heart is broken. Eight months have passed since his partner Jim (Matthew Goode) was killed in a car crash, but George is still coming to terms with his loss.
“For the first time in my life, I can’t see my future,” he opines, adding that what he sees in the mirror isn’t “so much a face, as the expression of a predicament”.
Of course, it didn’t help that Jim’s parents shut him out of the funeral service and refused to acknowledge his part in Jim’s life.
That’s forced George into his shell and virtually everyday goes by in a haze, but today, he decides, is going to be different.
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Colin Firth plays A Single Man’s George Falconer.
Based on Christopher Isherwood’s 1964 novel of the same name, A Single Man is an expertly crafted, elegantly shot and emotionally powerful film.
Thematically the story is a reminder of the excellent Wonderboys, the recent Lucky Hank or the Coen Brothers’ A Serious Man (university professor suffers midlife and existential crises), while visually it evokes the sumptuous style and colour rich palette of Far From Heaven.
Better known as a fashion designer, first-time writer-director Tom Ford makes fantastic use of different film speeds and stocks, as well as lighting and sound. Bringing a unique cinematic style to the project, Ford scores key scenes with natural sounds like rain and wind and has colour saturation ebbing and flowing to match George’s mood (a la Pleasantville).
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Visually arresting and incredibly moving, the now 14-year-old A Single Man is still quite simply one of the best movies of the 21st century so far.
The fabulous evocation of early 1960s Southern California comes courtesy of the same production design team that puts together TV’s Mad Men, while a multinational composing team of Poland’s Abel Korzeniowski and Japan’s Shigeru Umebayashi (In the Mood For Love) combine to create a string-infused soundtrack that brings back memories of Bernard Hermann’s work for Alfred Hitchcock on the likes of Psycho and Vertigo.
Rightly nominated for an Oscar, Firth (Genova) is simply stunning as the bereft George. Always known for his dashing good looks and vulnerability, Firth ages gracefully here as a 50-something haunted by the past and questioning his future. “If it’s going to be a world with no time for sentiment . . . it’s not a world that I want to live in,” is one of the many lines delivered with both memorable panache and passion.
He is ably supported by the always luminous Julianne Moore (Still Alice), who sports an Emma Thompson- esque English accent to play George’s booze-soaked and regret-filled best friend Charlie and The Great’s Nicholas Hoult, who plays George’s young acolyte Kenny.
Visually arresting and incredibly moving, the now 14-year-old Single is still quite simply one of the best movies of the 21st century so far.
A Single Man is now available to stream on TVNZ+.
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