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Friday
30Oct2009

Movie Review - 'An Education'

DateFriday, October 30, 2009 at 2:10AM
An Education

Starring Carey Mulligan, Peter Sarsgaard, and Alfred Molina
Directed by Lone Scherfig
Rated PG-13

educationposter.jpg Jenny is more headstrong than her father easily accepts and smarter than he even realizes. She studies not so she can go to Oxford and fulfill his dream but so she can be something other than her father's daughter. But at only 16, Jenny is more headstrong than she needs to be and not as smart as she thinks she is.

An Education takes place in early 1960s London, but it could be just about anywhere at any time. The story is not altogether original, but that's not a complaint. In fact, the familiarity of this sort of journey makes it endlessly malleable, and this is just another way to shape it.

Something happens to Jenny (Carey Mulligan) while walking home in the rain one afternoon: She meets a man. David (Peter Sarsgaard) drives a car like she's never seen before. He's interested in art, the classics, and peppers his conversation with words like "bourgeoisie." Suffice it to say, the working class boys Jenny's age are not cut from that cloth. She swoons, but so does he. Despite the fact that she's a teenager and he's clearly much older, there is a chemistry neither can deny and soon enough, neither tries to fight it.

But this is not a romance through and through. It's, as the title suggests, an education. But you don't need to sit in a classroom to learn some of the most valuable lessons, and without even realizing it, Jenny is taking a master class. As her relationship with David progresses, all of Jenny's hard work in school takes a back seat.

You would think the downturn in her grades would anger her father (Alfred Molina), but as it happens, David is equally adept at charming parents as he is their young daughters. So weekend trips are not out of the question to dear old dad and those things that are out of the question, David manages to circumvent them with carefully placed lies.

An Education becomes about the choices Jenny makes and declines to make in a hurry. The first blush of love, the angst of being 16, the worry that she's doing the right thing are all evident in Carey Mulligan's portrayal, and it only takes you about three or four minutes to understand where all the Best Actress talk comes from. It's one of those performances out of nowhere; Mulligan is far from a household name, there's no proven track record for director Lone Scherfig for most moviegoers, and the film itself wouldn't have a high profile on the surface.

You'll thank me later for watching this performance. She's fantastic, and her vulnerabilities constantly wrestle with Jenny's strength trying to bubble up to the surface.

Sarsgaard and Molina are almost always reliable, and playing opponents in this sort of tug of war, you can see why Jenny's decisions are never as cut and dry as she'd like them to be. There's also good work in spot duty by Olivia Williams (Rushmore), Rosamund Pike (Die Another Day), and Emma Thompson.

Danish director Lone Scherfig has previously made films like Italian for Beginners and Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself, but this is the most accessible movie she's made to this point. It doesn't hurt that the script was written by the great Nick Hornby, the author of the books High Fidelity and About a Boy. His characters are always fully formed, sometimes uncomfortably so, and that's what helps An Education rise above the simplistic plot outline.

There is always discussion about films like this when they start getting Oscar consideration. Because the story isn't audacious or daring, some people think it disqualifies the movie from being considered the "best" anything. It isn't the boldness of a story that makes it memorable but the way it's told. Degree of difficulty is not the litmus test.

There's nothing remarkable about the basics of Casablanca, either, but it's one of the most enduring films of all time. And with a performance like Carey Mulligan's, An Education could be going through our minds for years to come.

AuthorColin Boyd | | in , | Print ArticlePrint Article | | Comment2 Comments |

Reader Comments (2)

Great review great review Colin...

I agree with every point you make, specifically the ones about Mulligan's vulnerability she brings to the role as well as stories are important the way their told and not necessarily the boldness...

Carey Mulligan has a fan with me for a long time coming...!

Tuesday, November 3, 2009 | Unregistered CommenterSEAN

I agree that it's a film well worth watching. I haven't see anything as good this year. It's clever and hilarious.
And I loved the performances - Carey Mulligan was fantastic.
One quibble - without giving anything away - what did you make of the voiceover at the end? I think it was a dip below the consistent excellence of everything that had gone before. The makers had a problem coming up with an ending, see here http://wp.me/pDjed-6h

Tuesday, December 1, 2009 | Unregistered Commenterblackwatertown

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