You know a movie doesn't have much going for it when the only thing your friends who've seen it have to say is that the performances are good. It's almost like they're saying, "If the actors didn't come with it and make the whole thing bearable to sit through, I would've bailed and snuck into '2012' again."
I've certainly been getting the good-performance raves from colleagues who've seen "An Education." This stylishly cute, coming-of-age period piece is already poised to become a major Oscar contender. Indeed, the movie does exude the sort of middlebrow mediocrity that Oscar voters just lap up, like fresh water in a dog bowl.
"Education" takes us back to London, in the about-to-be-groovy '60s. That's where we meet Jenny (Carey Mulligan), a 16-year-old lass who is about to get a crash course on love and life. While her parents (Alfred Molina and Cara Seymour) urge her to keep her mind on her studies so she can go straight to Oxford, she has higher aspirations of going to Paris, smoking, listening to Jacques Brel and doing other kinds of siddity French stuff.
Then, she meets David (Peter Sarsgaard), a dashing Englishman who shares our girl's yen for living a life full of culture and adventure. Sure, dude is in his 30s, and he's involved in shady dealings with his friend and business associate (Dominic Cooper). But, hey, the man's charming. Even Jenny's parents are smitten with him.
Somehow, some way, "Education" manages to do something I haven't seen since those teen sex comedies of the '80s: it makes statutory rape look adorable. Thanks to Lone Scherfig's nostalgically mod, starry-eyed direction, a bon mot-filled script by author Nick Hornby and - yes - good performances, "Education" keeps this love affair darling, even though we know it's morally messed up. (Apparently, getting it on with minors was all the rage back then.)
With that said, it suffers from the same thing that plagues many female-centric, coming-of-age movies: It's dull. Even when Jenny finds herself at a crossroads - should she continue in her studies or abandon it all to be with David? - it seems less grave than the movie makes it out to be. And this is proven by how the movie turns out, as the ending makes this girl's maiden romance seem more incidental than life-altering.
What's sad is that this is all based on a true story, adapted from a memoir by Lynn Barber. It's movies like this that bring to mind Dennis Hopper's infamous line from the movie "Search and Destroy": "Just because it happened to you does not make it interesting."
Of course, the performances are good. Mulligan pulls off the arduous task of being the most sensible, mature 16-year-old in the history of cinema. You like her even when you don't believe for one minute that a teenager could be that level-headed. Sarsgaard once again continues his streak of playing charismatic dudes who you can tell just ain't right. And the always-reliable Molina takes his blustery buffoon of a father and makes him a flawed figure just trying to steer his child on the right path.
It's funny that "Education" is coming out in the Triangle on the same day as that other, retro, feminine, coming-of-age drama "Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire." While they both exhibit the same bathetic, for-your-consideration sentimentality, "An Education" is more, shall we say, dainty than the urban horror show that is "Precious." So, while some people will strap themselves into the gritty, gully hell ride of "Precious," others will sit back, relax and take in the safe, breezy, dang-near-inoffensive blandness of "An Education."
