The Father | Hollywood Movie Review by Anupama Chopra | Film Companion

  

The Father is a devastating film. One man’s descent into dementia, becomesa gutting reminder of your own mortality. The heartbreak of watching Anthony’s mind, and with it,his relationships unravel is almost unbearable at times. The film reminded me of Gerard ManleyHopkins famous poem Spring and Fall, in which the poet begins by asking a young child, “Margaret are you grieving,Over Goldengrove unleaving?” He goes on to say: “Now no matter, child,the name; Sorrow’s springs are the same,” and concludes with the lines, “It is the blightman was born for, It is Margaret you mourn for.” By the end of The Father, I was a blubbering mess,mourning as much for Anthony as for myself. The Father is the feature film debut ofcelebrated French playwright Florian Zeller, who adapted it along with ChristopherHampton from his own award-winning play. Anthony is a retired engineer, who lives alone in aspacious, tastefully decorated apartment in London. His daughter Anne visits regularlyto check up on him. It’s a routine enough scenario and we assume thatwhat we are seeing is actually happening. But then Zeller pulls the rugout from under our feet. People morph into other people. The apartment’s spaces, colorsand furniture change, this device orchestrated by productiondesigner Peter Francis is a masterstroke, because at first you wonder if youweren’t paying enough attention, or if like Anthony, you just forgot. Time loops on itself, so that a scene whichappears to be following another scene, is actually revealed as the one preceding it. The screenplay puts us inside Anthony's head. Like him, we're struggle to make senseof what is happening. It’s terrifying. And this is what makes The Father so brilliant. The film seamlessly blends genuinefear with overwhelming sadness. In places, Anthony’s disorientation, which isalso ours, seems straight out of a horror film. In one scene, he hears the voice of his seconddaughter Lucy and walks out of his bedroom, but the apartment transforms into a nursing home. We also see flashes of viciousness in hisbehavior, especially with his caregivers. Early in the film, we are told that the third one recentlyleft, among other things, he called her a bitch. There are moments in which a hint of HannibalLecter seems to flutter over his expressions. Anthony Hopkins, who plays Anthony, became theoldest Best Actor Oscar winner for this performance. He is absolutely magnificent, glidingfrom charming to cruel in a heartbeat. There are close-ups in which you can almost seethe fog in his mind descending over his eyes. Anthony is both horribly vulnerable,but also brutal. And when you see Anne’s stricken face,you wonder, was he a good father? Anthony clearly had a favorite daughter. In one scene, he dismisses his deadwife with the adjective 'sober'. Meanwhile Anne veers between sadness,affection and wanting to strangle him. Oscar-winning actor Olivia Colmanis also remarkable as Anne, a daughter torn between trying to do the rightthing by her father and trying to live her own life. In a scene that broke my heart, she helps him toput on a sweater, as a mother might with her son. It’s the only time in the film that he thanks her. But Anne’s burden frays her marriage,Rufus Sewell plays her embittered husband. There is one especially horrifyingexchange between him and Anthony, but did it actually happen like this? We don’t know. The Father also features strong turnsby Imogen Poots and Mark Gatiss. In the way it deals with decay anddeath and is mostly set in an apartment, The Father might remind you ofMichael Haneke’s masterful Amour. Like that film, this one will also forceyou to confront your death. But it also nudges you, as a charactersays, to go for a walk while it’s sunny. Because there is no escaping the fact that forall of us, the Goldengrove is unleaving. You can watch The Father on theLionsgate Play streaming service.