★★★★ | Brooklyn
This film has already garnered several awards and is up for a handful of Oscars too – and rightly so. This is that rare thing – a film that won’t offend anyone, telling a truly touching story, perfectly acted and beautiful to watch.
The story is simple, and has that age old appeal of all good romances – girl leaves home, meets boy, meets another boy and has a quandary…
This is all set against a dual backdrop of Ireland and the New World of New York. Colm Toibin’s novel has been given the big screen treatment but in a sensitive way – retaining some of the novels humanity to showcase the character of Ellis Lacey, played with such subtlety by Saoirse Ronan.
Set in a lovingly recreated 1950s, Ellis leaves her hometown to travel over to New York and begin a new life. True to form she meets a variety of characters like her landlady played by Julie Walters, and a bunch of other single ladies, each with a story to tell, but this is Ellis’s time and Ellis’s story.
She meets and falls for an Italian-American, Tony Fiorello, played by Emory Cohen, and thus stats her introduction to the new city the new life and new love.
But a family crisis demands she returns to the homeland, at least for a time, and while there, her head is turned by Jim Farell (Domhnall Gleeson) and so starts her predicament. The boy in front of her, or the boy back in her new home?
Both offer futures, but vastly different ones. Which to choose?
Now that would be telling – treat yourself! Grab a family tub of Ben & Jerry’s, a box of Kleenex and rent/buy this to watch and restore your faith in human nature and Hollywood’s ability to still produce this type of film adaptation without ruining it.
As mentioned, it has already won BAFTA for Best British Film, and is also up for 3 Oscars: Best Picture, Actress in a Leading Role and Adapted Script/Writing.
Available from Amazon
iTunes
