Perfect hopelessness

Rating: 10/10 (31 December 2008)

Having read and loved the novel, I can honestly say this is one of the best book to screen adaptations I've seen. It's extremely faithful to Richard Yates' 1961 brooding tale but also highly imaginative in its cinematic reconfiguration. In a way, the film had a stronger impact on me than the book. Going through that whole story in two hours is a devastating experience.
Everyone who worked on this did such a solid job. The entire cast was magnificent. I won't elaborate on any individual performance, because each actor played it to perfection. Director Sam Mendes finally lives up to the standard he set with his first picture, American BEAUTY. Exploring the dark side of American suburbia definitely works for him. Thomas Newman's score is haunting and, although less complex, reminiscent of American BEAUTY's heavily atmospheric soundtrack.
The entire movie is gorgeous to watch. It's full of powerful images that will burn into your memory. I loved the slight surreality to everything. The styles, colors, and strict conformity of 1950s Connecticut has an other-worldly quality. I think it was the right choice to, ever so slightly, heighten and exaggerate the emotions and relations of the characters. It added much needed humor at times and kept things from getting overly raw and dirty. Despite all the stylistic choices, I still felt it was very grounded in reality, and I found it to be almost embarrassingly relatable at times.
If anything negative can be said, I could see this getting criticized for being too perfect, too calculated, too Oscar oriented. It may be all those things, but it's also full of life and truth. The novel is a literary classic. The rights for the film were purchased not long after its original publication, but at that time, no one knew how to make it. Everything aligned just right for this movie to happen. I couldn't imagine this film existing any differently. It may take place in a bygone era, but it has everything needed to be a timeless classic, and as long as people keep getting married, it will always be relevant.