By Dan Cohen, Santa Monica Reporter
Last time I talked about the first of two independent films that are currently recruiting a large following. “Precious,” is the raw, invigorating movie that may achieve blockbuster status before year’s end. While not nearly as high profile, “An Education,” from England, has shown surprising “legs” as it plays around the country. (Yes, make the trip to Philadelphia to see it.)
They’re almost companion pieces. Both are about women coming of age. But while the characters in “Precious” rage at each other at ear shattering volumes, no one in “An Education” raises his voice above normal conversation. And yet it just as firmly holds our attention.
London, early in the 60s. A young woman in her last year of high school is offered a ride home by a man twice her age, during an afternoon downpour. His sports car and suit should be ample warning, but they come veiled in a veneer of comic charm; he offers to give her cello a ride, on the pretense of protecting the instrument, while the girl will walk alongside. He makes it seem like it doesn’t matter that she gets soaked. She responds, and right away a complex dynamic is established.
A dumber girl would steer clear of David (Peter Sarsgaard) at all costs. He’s 30ish, dapper and way too knowing for Jenny. But he appeals for having leapfrogged the monotony of Jenny’s middle class life. Another warning; his friend’s wear glamour like a shield. Complicating matters even further, he’s a Jew. But Jenny (Carrie Mulligan) is headstrong enough to believe she can handle him, and bored enough to overlook the price she’ll have to pay.
David, street smart, and low key, knows exactly how to sidestep Jenny’s aggressively protective family. Sensing the Oxford education her father (Alfred Molina) covets for her, David mixes references to academics with an air of affluence that completely disarms him. In one deftly executed maneuver he sparks the imagination of both Jenny and her parents, for very different reasons. No mean feat.
It isn’t long before Jenny gets wise to how David and his friend Danny come to their money. And that they’re scoundrels. But David is several steps ahead of her. He coolly confesses that he isn’t as smart as she, and if he didn’t do what he does, life would be boring. She accepts it, quietly assuming that she’s clever enough to draw her own boundaries. Which she does, until his influence begins to undermine her school work.
We know the trouble that’s brewing from the very beginning. But the movie is a Venus fly trap that lures us with its sweet craft. Its various trappings, from rich supporting characters, to a nostalgic score, to a subtle period recreation, are so well assembled that real suspense is generated. And while sex, of course, is part of the mix, its handled in perspective; Jenny’s seduction has much more to do with needs that go beyond the physical.
David, it turns out, has a pressing need to escape his own circumstances, which is satisfied by the attention of the sort of girl, who, on some level, is beyond his reach. It’s hard to imagine an Oxford educated Jenny, anywhere near his age, falling for his line. But swaddled in school girl existentialism, (Camus comes up in their banter,) Jenny is vulnerable. Questioning David’s personae would be a capitulation to her irksome, bourgeois roots, which she’s not prepared to do.
One of the nicest surprises is how smoothly the very American Sarsgaard eases into the role of this very British character. You wonder how the producers, or the Danish director, Lone Scherfig ( “Italian For Beginners,” ) came to choose him. In any case he plays the part with a seductive accent and a trace of self mocking humor.
Carrie Mulligan, who comes to her role with almost no other associations, is completely believable. Just short of beauty, she calls on the same resources that make Ellen Page so appealing. The physically gifted Rosamund Pike turns the role of the idiot girlfriend into a low key, comic spree. Others, particularly Olivia Williams, dressed down as Jenny’s supportive teacher and Emma Thompson, as Jenny’s bigoted and unforgiving school principal, seamlessly fill their parts.
“An Education” was adapted by Nick Hornsby, from a brief memoir by a journalist, Lynn Barber. Hornsby, the successful novelist and screenwriter, (“High Fidelity,”) has steered clear of the cloying sentimentality that, at least for me, marred his biggest hit, “About a Boy.”
As a director, Scherfig made her name with “Italian For Beginners,” which was shot in a bare bones video style. In spite of that, and the foreign language barrier, the movie grossed an impressive 4 million dollars here. “An Education,” is shot in classic fashion, by the French born John De Borman, who did the glossier but less effective “Last Chance Harvey,” and the classic English comedy, “The Full Monty.” De Borman has turned out two dozen features of all budget levels. This time he’s married subtle, but detailed lighting to a very particular look, that’s warm without being overly sentimental.
“An Education” cuts deep but without drawing any blood. It doesn’t need to. At its heart it’s a shrewd adult comedy that delivers exactly what the title promises.
