February 14, 2011: Another Year
I had figured, based on the title and the fact that this film was written and directed by Mike Leigh, that someone in the movie was going to be given just one more year to live. As it turns out, Another Year instead takes the attitude that life goes on despite the ups and many downs experienced by people across society, but Leigh manages to make even that message kind of a downer.
That’s not to say this isn’t an inspiring and excellent film. On the contrary, the deeply incisive performances and matter-of-fact setting make the reality of the film’s themes even more strikingly genuine, as we follow a year in the lives of a middle-aged central couple, and the friends, family and acquaintances who populate their lives through that time. Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen play the couple, who live a quiet and contented life in the outskirts of London. Their son has established himself in the world but continues to search for companionship. Their extended family are only occasionally seen because they don’t particularly have anything in common. They enjoy spending time with their good friends, but find their time somewhat taxed by acquaintances as well as old friends with whom they don’t really share much of a connection anymore. For the most part, they manage to hold it together, and they rely upon their time alone with each other to process what’s gone on around them. I think they both secretly wrestle with the question of why they are so lucky as to have avoided so many of life’s pitfalls, when they don’t think that what they do is so remarkable. They do remain on an even keel most of the time, though at times to their own detriment as they let certain friends suck the energy out of them, but they stand up and strike back when it’s appropriate and they are not pushovers. There’s drama here but not melodrama; this is on the scale of the little arguments that real people get into.
I think Another Year is, in the end, an affirmation of how the ability to enjoy the simple pleasures in life (gardening, cooking, wine, books) is a major key to finding contentment. Accepting one’s own personality and living that life is important, and when people forget to do that, they find themselves wanting in all kinds of ways.
Reassuring treatise on achievement of happiness.
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