Review of 45 Years (2015) by Kyle B — 18 Jan 2016

An interesting character study of a married couple that seem to have had 45 wonderful years of marriage until one curveball changes everything. Charlotte Rampling is an actress I'm not to familiar with asides from a handful of supporting performances but she is just luminous between the gaze of her stares to the resting curious look on her face throughout.

She is really great and I'm glad to see her nominated for Best Actress though it was a little underwhelming from the amount of love her supporters have been raving about for months. That doesn't damage the movie in anyway just my bad rap with mixing too much baggage going into movies.

Tom Courtenay is also really great especially in the final scene and he and Rampling have tremendous chemistry. Andrew Haigh really knows how to tell stories about complex relationships as I am a huge fan of the cancelled too soon Looking on HBO and the way he captures this couple's dynamics is really personal and unique and we could really understand this relationship just from spending time with them for only a week.

It does feel a bit incomplete and leaves you kind of wanting a little more like a rebuttal from Ramping but it is more about quietness and tenderness rather than explosions in relationship mood swings which I guess would be out of character for Rampling and Courtenay since this curveball seems like the first time they hit a bump in their 45 year marriage.

This is one that I recommend you see in a theater so you can really get the intimacy of it and also be wide awake as it is very quiet (I was a tad tired and found myself drifting but not because the movie bored me).