Review: Love Is Strange...This Film Is Sweeeet

Love Is Strange

Starring: John Lithgow, Alfred Molina, Marisa Tomei and Charlie Tahan
Directed by: Ira Sachs
Written by: Ira Sachs and Mauricio Zacharias
Rated: M     114 Minutes

How about those gays eh? They always have such exciting friends, actors, writers, artists. With those friends they’re always have fabulous dinners and parties and always manage to get the best seats at the theatre or invites to opening nights at exhibitions or ‘happenings’. Their families are always eclectic and supportive, although there is the mouthy and judgy sister and dad seems a bit oh-I’m-not-sure-about-all-this.  And boy do they know how to dress! It’s all so fun, even with the drop of angst and pathos Disneyland really should open GayLand so we can all get a bit of that.

Well at least according to movie makers.

‘Love is Strange’ gives us the story of artist Ben (John Lithgow) and music teacher George (Alfred Molina) who get married after 40 years as a couple. Making it legal and making them happy; oh good times.  Strangely the school George teaches at decides getting married is just not on for their highly respected and much loved staff member so they sack him. Bit of a stretch no? Oh well it gives a good stepping off point at least so let’s just go with it, feel a bit miffed and start rooting for the underdog so we can all get through this together.

The dismissal causes somewhat of a financial squeeze, especially in the high priced New York apartment scene and so they have to sell their West Village home. George looks for somewhere affordable, stays with neighbours (a couple of gay coppers) while Ben moves in with his niece Kate (played by the wonderful Marisa Tomei) in Brooklyn. The moving in requires Ben to take a bunk with the obligatory troubled teenaged son Joey (Charlie Tahan). Kate's a writer and Ben is always around, a constant distraction, Joey needs his 'space' and of course no one 'gets' him, while George is too old to couch-surf and can live without all the hot young bods constantly partying around him. As this all plays out what becomes evident is how neither is complete without the other, they are the epitome of a 'couple'. So when the system forces them apart what made them a great team becomes clearer, And this is where the film shines, where it gives us its heart.  

Ira Sachs has directed thoughtful and funny, sometimes moving story of a loved up and caring couple. They just happen to be two older blokes but, apart from the necessary nods to a same sex relationship, that is really neither here nor there and is not amplified to any extent. This is a story of a union, a loving unit overcoming physical separation. It tells us family is a safety net while at the same time being a troublesome smothering force and a swag of complexity when everything else militates against us.

And, I think Ira and co-writer Mauricio Zacharias have given us a reminder about resilience. 

This is a quiet, gentle film with sweet and sure performances from Lithgow and Molina. There is no yelling, no shrillness, it whispers and speaks to us; there is no shouting or speaking at us. And there is a bit going on that catches up with you later when you think about the movie. Ben and George have one kind of relationship but look over here at the relationship between Kate and her hubby Elliott (played in a rather odd, non facially expressive way by Darren E. Burrows). The men just want to be together, they need to be, the niece and husband seem to be a couple together out of habit, of expectation. Interesting.

I want to mention Charlie Tahan as the troubled teen Joey. This could have been a clichéd performance of a slightly underwritten character but Tahan turned it from a closed-in and confounding young man with a broken and yearning heart, wanting the 'more' of life that he can't quite get clear in his mind. Ben isn't his saviour by any means, nor his soul mate, not even guiding light. BUT he did make a difference and the exquisitely underplayed denouement is heartbreakingly beautiful thanks to Charlie's acting.

This film could have gone in so many different directions and could have ended up as a campy, cloying gay rom com. It did not and was not, thank goodness.

Go see it and feel that little bit uplifted for at least the rest of your day.

Do you ever wonder though about the young gay bloke who works as oh I don’t know a baker perhaps and does his work, goes home, maybe has an occasional fling but mostly lives a quiet life at home and with his friends and workmates, isn’t into any ‘scenes’. He doesn’t hide his sexuality, isn’t at all bothered by it and no one else seems bothered by it. Ever wondered who’s making the movies for him to relate to, to see himself portrayed in? Or is it only ‘interesting’ or ‘valid’ when difference is ‘noticeable’ or somewhat ‘more’?

Just sayin’.

3 out of 5