You don't have to have everything...just something

Rating: 9/10 (7 September 2009)

Revolutionary Road is the story of a couple in the suburbs of Connecticut. April (Winslet) is an aspiring actress whose dreams had never worked out, and is now a stay-at-home mom and wife. Frank (Dicaprio) is the man of the family, supporting his wife and kids with a job he hardly likes and a life he finds, in his own moments of pure bliss "hopeless emptiness". Other characters are also of vital importance in this movie and add so much depth to it. There is John (Michaeal Shannon), a "supposed" not-well i.e. mentally insane person who is the son of next-door neighbours Helen& Howard Givings (Bates& Easton). There is also the war-time veteran friend of Frank, whose name I miss, and his wife, which seem, but are not really happy.
SPOILER ALERT!!
Story goes that the main couple had dreams. Frank wanted to see the world and live in Paris, and April wanted to become an actress. Frank wanted to feel emotions, and maybe that is why April married him. April saw in Frank a man who could live out his life the way he wanted, and she could follow suit.
However, things don't turn out well, dream-wise. April and Frank end up having kids, moving to the suburbs an empty life. Emptiness and shallow, and as John puts it so vividly and truthfully in front of them, they should feel sorry for themselves because they had not followed their dreams, like they had promised, though never said, they would. Dreams take hold of them, and they grow apart. Both have affairs, are cold to each other, and say terrible things to each other and make terrible mistakes which they can't get back. Things turn for the worse when April, in a bid to free herself of the life she supposedly hates, performs an abortion on herself. The family falls apart. Frank moves out of the neighbourhood, and is now spending as much time as he can with his kids.
What strikes me in this movie is the realism of the past it portrays. These people are only 50 years or so away from us. They have cars and speak the same language and feel the same emotions, but at times seem distant, as for eg the way women are treated then. Yet at other times, they are so close to home, with the same social problems that couples nowadays have. Affairs. Kids. Emotional upheavals due to work. Neighbours and friends being...just neighbours...and friends, as in putting their own interests in front of yours for the sake of friendship and selfishness. And what happened to us wanting to be big and make a difference in this world? It is all gone? Families are torn apart. Can we be happy? Can we go on?
The answer is simple. Of course we can. Because that is what we do. We live. We die. The cycle goes round and round. We have problems. We deal with them. We think wisely. We educate ourselves. We deal with them. We rationalise, because in my opinion, that is the only way forward. And if we can't achieve our dreams, it is all right. We live by what we have, by the kids we are bringing up, and trying new things and doing things out of the ordinary. Heck, you don't have to go to Paris to live. You just have to live with yourself and the ones you love, and only then they would mean the world to you, and the rest of the world mean nothing. This is I think what the message of the movie is. You try so hard to reach your dreams, and you get confused along the way. You hurt the ones you love, because you think they don't understand. But if you life, then life opens up to you. You become happy, just like Frank did at the end of the movie with his smile, watching his kids of the swing. Though not not extremely happy, or laughing his head of, he was content. I am not saying that is how one should lead one's life. I am just saying that if we are dealt a certain card in life, we should handle it to our best, and in my opinion, that would make us happy.
Brilliant performances by Leo& Kate, and Michael Shannon, and all the other actors& actresses. Leo& Kate give so much depth into their characters that at times, it is very hard to read what they are about to say or do. Honestly, who would have thought April would go on with the abortion at the end of the film? I personally thought: either, she is going to commit suicide, or talk it out with Frank, or live out the rest of her life like that, the "perfect" household wife. Her resoluteness during the breakfast scene (perfectly played out) made me wonder whether she'd whoop out the knife the moment Frank pulled out of the driveway.
Music brilliant. In stark contrast to the horrific scene before and after April's abortion. I'm not an expert on decorations, but I believe the 1950s suburbs was nicely shown here.
A brilliant movie to watch& watch again. Good talking points and good education, because that is how we move forward. We educate ourselves on problems we have or might have, so that when situations come, we know how to handle them responsibly. And trust me, those scenes from the film are real. And they happen to everyone of us. If they haven't, just you wait and see.
9/10 for this movie. I felt the smoking scenes were just a bit too obvious here. But that's just my opinion. Again, education.