Little Children

I suppose this is one of those movies you're not supposed to waste your precious film festival tickets on. Y'know - good director (Todd Field) with a star-powered cast (Kate Winslet, Jennifer Connelly) - the kind of movie destined for wide release about a week after the festival closes. Well hey, I'm the guy who used one of his tickets to see Home Fries just to stalk Drew Barrymore - so this film choice actually represents an improvement in my selection process.

This film follows a number of seemingly disparate characters whose lives intersect in one way or another due to children. There is the wife who feels isolated from both her daughter and her husband, the "cool dad" who takes care of the kids while studying for a bar exam he never wants to pass, the ex-cop who has taken it upon himself to become the unofficial protector of all the children in the neighbourhood, and the recently released sex offender who spent 10 years in jail for exposing himself to a minor. All of their lives become inextricably linked through a series of well acted and completely believable plot twists.

Little Children is first and foremost a character study. Though "character study" is often a euphemism for a slow-moving and boring movie - this film is anything but. I could see pieces of my friends in many of the characters (NO - not the pedophile) and was totally engrossed in the minutiae of their lives. You even manage to empathize with the plight of the sex offender. Couple these excellent character sketches with a complex and thought-provoking plot and you are left with quite a stellar film. I would be surprised if this film didn't generate significant buzz (if it hasn't already).

Though the director called this piece a "satirical drama", it was a very difficult film to watch as he deftly crafted a film with an underlying tension that claws at your belly and leaves you feeling unsettled long after the movie is over. In other words, it was much heavier on the drama than the satire.

My one complaint was the voice-over narrative. If Derek hadn't told me that this film was based on a book, that fact would have become quite clear within the movie's first few narrative-heavy minutes. I found that the voice-over rarely added to the film and instead seemed (at times) to actually cheapen the work and give the film a "Desperate Housewives" feel. However, read this as a very minor complaint in the overall scheme of things.

Loved the movie, glad we picked it - and I didn't even stalk Kate Winslet. Maybe I am growing up.