An Education

Genre: romantic comedy drama

With: Carey Mulligan (Jenny Mellor), Alfred Molina (her father Jack), Cara Seymour (her mother Marjorie), Olivia Williams (Miss Stubbs), Peter Sarsgaard (David Goldman), Matthew Beard (Graham), Dominic Cooper (Danny), Rosamund Pike (Helen), Emma Thompson (Mrs. Walters, the Headmistress)

Director: Lone Scherfig

Screenplay: Nick Hornby (based on a memoir by Lynn Barber)

Release: 2009

Studio: BBC Films, Finola Dwyer Productions, Wildgaze Films et al.

Rating: PG

MBiS score: 8.0/10 

 

‟There’s so much I want you to see.” 

 

QuickView 

Story-line: Twickenham in the 1960s. Although Jenny Mellor, a brilliant high-school student, appreciates the support she receives from her watchful father and her boyfriend Graham, what she really wants is to leave home, study at Oxford and have a life of her own… hopefully in Paris. One rainy day, after a cello rehearsal, fate offers her a ticket to freedom... David Goldman, a charming man who will pull her out of her stifling little world.     

Pluses: fine performances by Carey Mulligan and Peter Sarsgaard (showing superb chemistry as a couple), delightful support from Alfred Molina and a faultless cast, competent direction, a spiffy screenplay enlivened by truthful, well-written dialogues, lovely cinematography and attractive production values.

Minuses: the story-line may seem a tad predictable to some viewers (me included). 

Comments: I’ll be frank: AN EDUCATION is not a work of great human import but it certainly fulfills its purpose as the illustration of one girl's struggles in a confusing world. Catchy, bittersweet and very pretty, Lone Scherfig’s work will please movie buffs with a taste for romance (and we are many!).  

 

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