Review of Boyhood (1951) by Eric H — 14 Aug 2015

I don't think a film has ever captured the experience of growing up quite like Boyhood has. By the end of the movie, I felt just as I did when I left my own home to start my family, and try to figure just what in the world I wanted to do with my life. It's a feeling of both loss and awe, fear and excitement and it's something we've all experienced at some point or another.

I never would have thought a film could capture a feeling that is predicated on an entire lifetime's worth of experiences, but that is exactly what Boyhood has achieved. It took 12 years of work for Richard Linklater to pull it off, but it was well worth the effort.

Like Mason in the film, I'm still trying to figure out my purpose in life. I'm not entirely convinced I'll ever figure it out. The great thing about Boyhood is it doesn't offer any kind of solution to this existential crisis. Instead, it urges us to simply take life one moment at a time. To keep moving forward and not dwell on our mistakes. To enjoy what little time we have, because life moves too fast to waste time on not being happy. Whether we find some kind of meaning is irrelevant if we don't enjoy the pursuit.