Review of A Single Man (2009) by Linda C — 29 Jan 2011

In theory Tom Fordâ(TM)s âA Single Manâ? should have spoken to me. It has a major ingredient that has always and will continue to intrigue me: a bleak portrayal of loss. Thereâ(TM)s hope in the world for a lot of people to move past something, but George (Colin Firth) hardly saw light in the darkness of what was affecting him so deeply, which is the loss of his lover Jim (Matthew Goode). The few moments spent between George and Jim are incredibly delicate and warming. Their sarcasm and candor lifted the characters out of any cliched gay territory and made them very human. Thereâ(TM)s been a lot of gay characters in the movies that have sort of worked, though itâ(TM)s mostly felt stereotypical, forced and unloving, but what Colin Firth and Matthew Goode pulled off was fantastic, to say the least.

For the twenty-five total minutes of honest character ponderings and thoughtful conversations, thereâ(TM)s about seventy-minutes of theatrical confusion that annoyed me more than anything. I understand the film was attempting to be very lucid, as George was in a place of total chaos that would cause him to drift in and out of consciousness at inopportune times, but much of it felt unnecessary. Tom Ford definitely has an eye for photography. The grainy images remind you of faded memories, and the over-all design is straight from an architecture magazine. With that being said, itâ(TM)s definitely Fordâ(TM)s major strength, but one that is overused. Greatly over-used. To a point where style and technique weigh down any momentum the story had & the emotion necessary to keep the viewer constantly caring. If it wasnâ(TM)t for those few intimate moments with George and Jim, the film would not have worked at all.