An Education

A 16-year-old girl and her parents are seduced by a creepy dude with a lot of money. Girl learns school isn't really all that bad.

Nominated for:
Best Actress - Carey Mulligan
Writing Adapted Screenplay - Nick Hornby
Best Picture

I left the theater after seeing An Education perplexed, and a little grossed out, which was a shame, because I really wanted to like this movie.

The acting was fabulous. The dialog and story arc are quite lovely (as I would expect from my dear Nick Hornby). And the glamorous early 60's dresses that the ladies wear are fabulous, so why was I bored for most of this movie?

Ultimately, the film was just dull. The camera work was textbook generic, the lighting was uninspired, and the music was that shlocky, melodramatic orchestral crap meant to boss your emotions around (feel sad HERE, feel glad HERE). The editing was dull too, and this film could definitely have used a little bit of non-linear scrambling to add some intrigue.

All these things seem to have been ignored by the filmmakers, so why its received a Best Picture nomination is beyond me. I guess its worth watching if you want to convince your teen-aged daughter to stay in school and NOT get married to a handsome creep-o with lots of money. The movie doesn't really paint schooling in any kind of favorable light, which makes the moral of this tale something like - go to school and be alone for your life, or get married and be a bimbo.

Best picture? Nope. Best Writing? Nope. Best Actress? Possibly.

Maybe I would have enjoyed the movie more if Ben Folds (lyrics by Nick Hornby) had done the music...

Eli