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ne of my five favorite previews for 2015 has been for the movie Carol, which is, more or less, Cate Blanchett narrating a quick story about her life in 1952 New York City. We don’t learn much about it, except that she’s married to Kyle Chandler and that not everything is what it seems. At the start and then again at the end of the trailer, Blanchett mentions how everything comes full circle. The trailer is captivating and made me want to see it. It’s directed by Todd Haynes, who has filmed just one movie (I’m Not There) between 2015’s Carol and 2002’s Far From Heaven. In Carol, Haynes returned to what worked in Far From Heaven. We return to 1950s Northeast America. In both movies, Haynes craftily tells the stories of lives that are less perfect than they appear
If you could define this movie into a single theme, it would be conforming to society’s standards at the expense of personal happiness. The film stars Julianne Moore (Still Alice, The Hours) as Cathy Whitaker, a homemaker, mother of two, and wife of Frank (Dennis Quaid – Frequency, The Express), a successful executive at a company that sells television advertising. All seems well at home. A nationally recognized home living magazine is at the Whitaker house to feature Cathy and her seemingly perfect family and life. It’s all very much Leave It to Beaver at the start of this film, but, of course, if it stayed that way the whole time, we wouldn’t have the them that I presented in the first sentence of this paragraph.
There is a secret here. Specifically, Frank holds a secret that, in the 1950s, would ruin any sense of what is perceived to be a perfect marriage. It’s an issue that we didn’t fully understand back in the 1950s, and would ostracize a family man from his position in the corporate world. However, denying this secret is denying his chance at personal happiness. As much as Frank tries to deny this secret or get treatment to overcome it, he cannot. And this causes him to unravel even more by lashing out at Cathy as if it were her fault when, in fact, all she wants to do is help him and try to make him happy.
Cathy has a secret of her own that is frowned upon just as equally in 1950s America. She has struck a friendship with Raymond Deagan (Dennis Haysbert – television’s 24, television’s The Unit), the servant of Whitaker’s garden. Cathy is an upper-class white woman, while Raymond is a blue-collar black man. Raymond is a kind-hearted man with a child of his own. While just a handyman fixing up the house at first, Cathy realizes that the two have much in common. They quickly strike up a friendship. The problem is that friendships like this did not exist back in those days. The local neighbors begin gossiping about the married white woman spending time with the local black man, especially when the two are seen together in Raymond’s part of the town. Frank is furious that Cathy would make him look bad by befriending someone he shouldn’t be associated with. He has his anger, which he directs at Cathy, because he feels this is a situation he can control, whereas he seems unable to do anything about his problems.
This movie is tough to watch at times. It is sad when we are unable to live the lives we want to live. Some difficulties are more difficult to overcome than others. However, when we are forced to be someone we are not because of society, it can be not easy. We are a far more accepting society in 2015 than we were in 1952. People, hopefully, have a much easier time being who they want to be. When someone expresses a problem with someone being who they want to be, that person has more resources/security to stand up for themselves. More people will stand up for you when someone is unfair to you. None of the characters in Far From Heaven could be who they wanted to be without ramifications. None of these characters was malicious in any way. Instead, they were forced to make decisions to either conform to society’s standards or go against the norm and suffer the consequences.
Plot 8.5/10
Character Development 7.5/10
Character Chemistry 7.5/10
Acting 8/10
Screenplay 8.5/10
Directing 8/10
Cinematography 9.5/10
Sound 8/10
Hook and Reel 8/10
Universal Relevance 10/10
83.5%
B
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