Living (2022, PG-13)

*Premise spoilers.*

All right, this is officially the last Oscar movie I’m getting in before the Oscars. This quiet British character drama is an English-speaking adaptation of a 1952 Akira Kurosawa film. I’ll shamefully admit that I haven’t seen Ikiru, so this may in fact be an Infernal Affairs/The Departed situation. But as someone without knowledge of the original film, I thought Living was pretty beautifully done.

When Mr. Williams, a staid civil servant living and working in post-war London, learns that he has terminal cancer, he’s at a loss. His attempt at a seaside holiday comes by fits and starts, and try as he might, he can’t bring himself to tell his son and daughter-in-law. The only thing that cuts through his stupor is Miss Harris, a cheerful young woman who used to work in the same office.

Again, I haven’t seen Ikiru, so I can’t speak to the “adapted” part of Living’s Best Adapted Screenplay nomination. It took me a little while to get into the rhythm of the film, which opens very slowly and takes its time to find its central theme. This can make it feel meandering in the early passages, but once it settles in, the story is a lovely meditation on mortality, happiness, and meaning/worth.

I’m reminded, if only a little, of the film adaptation of A Single Man. Both movies really pull you into their setting—in the case of Living, you feel the relentlessly spinning wheels of government bureaucracy, the disorientation of a tidy life being turned on its head, and the trailing whispers of neighbors tutting about impropriety. And both films bring you into the world of a man who feels cut off from his life, separated from everything going on around him by a private veil, and only small but special moments are able to break through and reach him.

I’ve always found Bill Nighy to be an interesting actor, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him quite like this. While many performances I’ve seen of his are fairly understated, he still brings a major sense of presence to every role. Mr. Williams, meanwhile, begins the film noted more for his blankness than anything else. Throughout, he’s so quiet and unassuming. It would be easy to think that Nighy isn’t doing much here. But again, in rare moments, Mr. Williams grasps at something real, and Nighy is captivating in those scenes, letting you glimpse everything that’s been running beneath the character’s still waters. He garners the film’s other Oscar nomination, for Best Leading Actor.

Aimee Lou Wood, who plays Aimee on Sex Education, does a lovely job as Miss Harris. You understand why Mr. Williams is taken with her, but Wood always plays her like a person, not a symbol or a concept. And given that I’ve only ever seen her play a teenager, I was impressed that Miss Harris felt convincingly grown-up throughout. The film also features Zoe Boyle (Lavinia from Downton Abbey,) Adrian Rawlins (who I saw most recently as the doctor in Narkina 5 on Andor,) and Oliver Chris (who I’ve seen crop up in a number of National Theatre Live recordings.)

Warnings

Thematic elements, drinking/smoking, brief sexual content, and mild language.