FANS OF WRITER/DIRECTOR Andrew Haigh know that it’s only a matter of time until he catches on big. We True Believers have been waiting very patiently until the rest of you learn his name, dead certain it’ll happen—the proof is in 2011’s Weekend, a romantic little two-hander about two men whose one-night stand blooms unexpectedly, and Looking, Haigh’s terrific HBO series about gay men in San Francisco. (Side note for Portland lit-nerds: Haigh is also slated to direct the film adaptation of Lean on Pete, local author Willy Vlautin’s unflinching take on a boy-and-his-horse novel. *eeeeee*)
With 45 Years—which got a best-actress Oscar nod for Charlotte Rampling’s performance—Haigh’s one step closer to becoming the household name he should be. His work is perceptive and compelling, subtle and sexy. He makes movies for the nosy—for those of us who turn down our headphones to eavesdrop on couples fighting on the bus. His characters roil with insecurities and needs they sometimes haven’t even articulated to themselves. The comedy and tragedy comes from watching those impulses work their way to the surface.
In the case of 45 Years, the surfacing is quite literal: On the eve of his 45th wedding celebration, Geoff (Tom Courtenay) finds out that the body of his long-ago lover, who died on a mountaineering trip, has emerged from the glacier where it’s been preserved in ice for almost 50 years.
Geoff is clearly agitated by the news, and his wife Kate (Rampling) is agitated by his agitation. Suddenly she’s peering in closets, looking through old photo albums, digging for clues to a relationship whose abrupt and violent end paved the way for her own long, happy marriage. She knows she should let the past stay buried, but she can’t quite manage it. Periodically, the sound of dripping water reminds us of the melting glacier, of ice-locked secrets slowly coming to light.
Like Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway, 45 Years is a story where party prep contains multitudes. Kate is watchful and wary as she drives to the city to pick out a dress, arrange a playlist, and book a venue. The party is meant to celebrate the couple’s long and happy wedding; instead, it marks a sea change in a marriage that’s long proceeded on a predictable, inexorable (and yes, glacial) course.
Had Charlotte Rampling refrained from offering her opinion on the Oscars boycott (“racist to white people”), we’d all be offering unqualified raves of her performance here. Since she did recently share her antediluvian two cents, here’s a qualified rave: It’s a tremendous performance from an actress who’s apparently kind of an old racist? Courtenay, too, gives a rumpled and lived-in performance as a man torn between the siren song of nostalgia and his real life. By the end of the film, we begin to understand how his wife feels about him, because we feel it too: protective, affectionate, mistrustful, alert to the possibility of change.
45 Years is a great little movie, complex and compelling and brilliantly constructed. If you don’t know it already, now would be a great time to learn Andrew Haigh’s name.
Charlotte Rampling still Rocks in my book.
One of the finest actors ever.
“Why classify people? There are always problems: ‘He’s less handsome’ or ‘He’s too black’ or ‘He’s too white.’ There will always, always be someone who will say, ‘Oh, you’re too…’ What are we going to do? We’re going to classify all that to create thousands of little minorities everywhere? — CHARLOTTE RAMPLING
um, that’s the opposite of a racist, Ms. Hallett…although the fact you threw in “old” makes you an ageist. Unless that was a stab at a joke on your part… in which case that makes you bad at two things.
It may be “the opposite of racist,” but it’s the very definition of “blissfully ignorant of one’s white privilege.” Want to throw in an “all lives matter” reference?
It’s a profound film and it’s a very unique film on how much do you really know a person. I caught Charlotte Rampling on the red carpet in Hollywood outside the TCL Chinese Theater: http://hollywoodglee.com/2015/… She gives a deep insight into the relationship factor. Check it out. I also reviewed the film.
@ eprophet
um, so you start off by agreeing with my statement…but then still feel the need to find some sad way of shoehorning in an insult to make me look like a bigot….got it. Way to “win” a battle. Oh, and Alison Hallett and Portland for that matter is the very definition of white hipster privilege. A real newspaper would have edited out her off subject editorial. Plus I see, due to your lack of mentioning it, that you’re also on board with her ageism. I hope neither one of you bitch too much when your asses get kicked to the curb when you hit an age that makes you irrelevant to society. You can respond if you want to but I won’t be checking back in. My statements hold up, yours don’t. You can insult me in the vacuum that is this rag.