A Single Man

A Single Man is the smartest and most visually interesting thing in the theaters right now. Even the trailer, and trailers are all starting to look the same these days, is almost as good as the one for Contempt. The film moves slowly, sometimes redundantly, as it follows Colin Firth’s character George through a day he has devoted to preparing for his suicide that night; preparations that are as ordered and meticulous as the starched shirts stacked neatly in his dresser or the toiletries stowed tidily in his bathroom. As deliberate and plodding as its pace is, the film never runs dry. Its shots are always rich and stylized, sometimes more like good photographs than scenes. We follow George at a voyeur’s distance as he empties his safe deposit box and lays out his funeral suit (tie to be tied in a Windsor), but then, as a gay college professor in the 1960s, George isn’t used to letting people in, even if he does live in a glass house.

Flashbacks to George’s relationship with his long-term partner, whose death is why he is determined to kill himself, as well as glimpses into what appears to be the “mind of George” (i.e. him naked underwater in a swimming pool), sometimes seem too visual and erotic, like a parody of an art house movie in a television commercial or, no surprise, an arty ad in a fashion magazine.

Between his errands, he’s tempted away from suicide, and we literally see the color come back into his face; an encounter with a neighbor girl and a fox terrier, a chance rendezvous with Carlos, and, most importantly, his seduction by his student Kenny (Nicholas Hoult), who plays George’s tempter, angel, and victim rolled into one. Not only is George’s will to die tested, but also the armor of self-control and self-imposed order he wears so well over his deep depression and loneliness. Armor that may have kept him going in the years following his partner’s death, but doesn’t fare so well in his chess game with death.

If you haven’t seen it, go see it at the Coolidge.