I watched this movie knowing nothing about it except that Julianne Moore was nominated for Best Actress in 2003. So without giving yet another synopsis of what the movie is about as so many of these reviews do, I will review my "non-filmologist" experience of watching this movie.
First of all, I have never heard of Douglas Sirk. Nor have I seen any of his films. What first struck me about this film was the muted acting and the stiff characters. I kept wondering why the lead actress' reactions to what was going on around her were so underwhelming. Surely a husband and wife would have more of an emotional reaction to what had just been discovered. I was confused by the "non-realism" of the dialog and the character's emotions.
But then about 2/3 of the way through the movie, it hit me. This movie isn't just set in the '50s and about society in the 1950s, but the ACTING, editing and everything else is also 1950s...with a couple of taboo subjects thrown in. It is just as if you are watching a film that was directly from that decade.
Suddenly, I went from thinking this movie is absurd...to thinking this movie is brilliant. And the key to that understanding was that the actors in this movie are acting as actors would have 50+ years ago. Of course, humans are humans and the reality of emotions and reactions and how we interact with each other has never changed no matter the decade or century. But this was the state of the art half a century ago and Far From Heaven does a masterful job of recreating that art.
You must convince yourself that you are watching a movie from more than five decades ago to truly appreciate what is being done on the screen. If you are thinking, "How would I react", or "How would she really react to that", then the point is being missed. This is retro art. And it is done very well.
First of all, I have never heard of Douglas Sirk. Nor have I seen any of his films. What first struck me about this film was the muted acting and the stiff characters. I kept wondering why the lead actress' reactions to what was going on around her were so underwhelming. Surely a husband and wife would have more of an emotional reaction to what had just been discovered. I was confused by the "non-realism" of the dialog and the character's emotions.
But then about 2/3 of the way through the movie, it hit me. This movie isn't just set in the '50s and about society in the 1950s, but the ACTING, editing and everything else is also 1950s...with a couple of taboo subjects thrown in. It is just as if you are watching a film that was directly from that decade.
Suddenly, I went from thinking this movie is absurd...to thinking this movie is brilliant. And the key to that understanding was that the actors in this movie are acting as actors would have 50+ years ago. Of course, humans are humans and the reality of emotions and reactions and how we interact with each other has never changed no matter the decade or century. But this was the state of the art half a century ago and Far From Heaven does a masterful job of recreating that art.
You must convince yourself that you are watching a movie from more than five decades ago to truly appreciate what is being done on the screen. If you are thinking, "How would I react", or "How would she really react to that", then the point is being missed. This is retro art. And it is done very well.