Review of The Face of Love (2013) by Roy S — 16 Mar 2014

This is a movie for adults. Its main characters are all middle-aged and the story about the loss of a long term spouse is not one that is likely to appeal to the younger set of movie goers. It is also a movie that is well written with references to art particularly that will take a sophisticated audience to appreciate.

For instance there is a visual reference to a David Hoxnie painting of a swimmer that requires more than a little knowledge of modern art to appreciate. Another example of the sophisticated writing involves avoiding the expected.

As the advertising blurb states, the audience knows that the strong resemblance of the character Tom, played by Ed Harris, to Nikki's (Annette Bening's character) to her dead husband, Garrett, will come out in the course of the movie.

More specifically they know that Tom will find out about it. After several false (and obvious) reveals, Tom learns about the situation in an unexpected way that makes sense and is not a stretch. Another temptation that the writers avoid is attempting to turn the movie into one with wide popular appeal.

They could have done it by emphasizing the comic aspects of the Tom/Garrett look alike premise, or they could have done it by turning it into a mad-slasher movie in which anyone of the four characters goes crazy once the look alike is revealed.

None of this happens, and four very competent actors are given space to present a story that adults of a certain age may well appreciate.