Director: Tom Ford
Starring: Colin Firth, Julianne Moore & Matthew Goode
An excellent drama and directorial debut for Tom Ford featuring an impressive performance from Colin Firth and is a film both impressive in design and in emotion.
Following the migration of music video and TV advert directors into the world of filmmaking, A Single Man sees the move of fashion designer Tom Ford into film. Any concerns filmgoers might have of a fashion designer directing a film are almost immediately dispelled at the results as A Single Man is an excellent drama that, unsurprising, is aesthetically beautiful but is also filled with emotion, a gripping story based on the novel by Christopher Isherwood with an excellent performance by Colin Firth in the lead role which is, perhaps, Firth’s finest on screen performance to date.
In 1962, just after the Cuban Missile Crisis, English professor George Falconer (Firth) is deep in mourning over the loss of his lover, of 16 years, Jim (Goode) to a car accident several months earlier. Tired of the day to day routine of pain, George decides this day will be different; this day will be his last. As he goes about his day and getting his affairs in order, he observes the beauties that he will miss, visits old friend Charley (Moore) and unexpectedly finds others reaching out to him including a student named Kenny (Nicholas Hoult), a drifter and Charley but will it change the ending he has planned for himself?
An impressive and emotionally engaging drama, A Single Man is filled with feeling beneath its beautifully presented surface. Unsurprisingly for a film made by a fashion designer, A Single Man is a very well presented film. With attention to period detail that recalls that of the critically acclaimed TV drama Mad Men (and set within the same era), Tom Ford also infuses the film with many visual cues. Often portrayed with George and his surroundings in faded colours, objects, people and whole scenes experience sudden rushes in colour when George is confronted with something of beauty that shapes him, however temporary, from his depression whether it be a flower he is smelling, the red lips on his assistant or the blue dress of a young girl who approaches him. The colour is even more present in scenes George shares with his student Kenny whose interest in George and his welfare touches the character and is especially present in his memories of good times spent with his lover Jim, all of which contrast with the gloom of the rest of the film which also reflect George’s emotional state. In a way, while sometimes a little too perfect or glossy, the look of A Single Man bears much in common with George himself as, in his mourning, he has retreated to a smartly presented, emotionally aloof British stereotype amongst the people he encounters in his day hiding his real feelings and depth below the surface.
A Single Man’s story is strengthened by the performance of Colin Firth as George. It is an excellent performance from Firth and, perhaps, the best of his career to date. He portrays George with weariness and pain and his attempts to portray a stuffy British demeanour around his American colleagues do not hide the emotional turmoil, the vulnerability lying beneath the surface. George’s pain is obvious as is his love for Jim. It is also impressive that Firth is able to show, not only in flashbacks of happier times, but through encounters during his ‘last day’ that there is warmth, humour and an appreciation of life at the heart of George’s character seen most in his time spent with Charley and in later scenes towards the end of his day with Kenny. Firth however, is not the only strong performer as Julianne Moore puts in a strong performance as the ageing party girl with whom George once had a relationship before admitting his own homosexuality and whose love for George and what might have been is also clear and is the vulnerability at her core now that she, like George, is separated from her partner. Matthew Goode demonstrates confidence and warmth as Jim in flashback scenes and Nicholas Hoult is likewise impressive as George’s student who bears many similarities to George and Jim.
A Single Man is an excellent drama that looks beautiful and is brimming with emotion beneath the surface. It is a film that is very honest and stirring and Colin Firth’s performance is worthy of every award or nomination it may receive. Excellent.
Rating: 5/5
