Review: 'Another Year'

At first, the lines seem clear, the deck slightly stacked. Tom (Jim Broadbent) is an engineering geologist, and his wife, Gerri (Ruth Sheen), is a therapist. They are deeply content: They work in their community garden and they have a good relationship with their thirtysomething son, Joe (Oliver Maltman), whom they want to get married, but are polite about it. In short, they seem like the perfect couple.

Their friends, however, are a mess, so much so that it's a little jarring. Mary (an award-bound Lesley Manville) is a nightmare, a work friend of Gerri's who couldn't be much more codependent. She is in constant need of attention, so she comes over to Tom and Gerri's house, drinks too much and complains bitterly all the time. Her delusion about a possible romantic relationship with Joe seems almost insane, and her rage at meeting his girlfriend (the excellent Karina Fernandez) is palpable and pathetic.

Tom's old school chum Ken (Peter Wright) is barely better, an overweight drunk but at least a nice guy. A lesser movie, or perhaps a more humane one, would get Ken and Mary together in the end. Not here. Their one private encounter is cringe-worthy, almost furiously so.

But as the seasons drag on (and they do seem to), one begins to get annoyed with Tom and Gerri's contentment. They are very well-meaning all the time, and that can be its own kind of exhausting. Gerri never seems to turn her therapy voice off - every word seems very slightly condescending - and Tom is a lovely guy, but always seems a little removed. For a therapist, Gerri seems incapable of realizing how enabling her relationship with Mary is. The whiff of Boomer entitlement is strong - no way they would ever be self-conscious about their own happiness.

And there is a staginess to the scenes, even the line readings, that almost punches through the realism. Leigh is a careful filmmaker, but his lack of stylishness feels like restriction here. Unlike the British kitchen-sink filmmakers (or John Cassavetes, for that matter, with whom Leigh is often compared), "Another Year" could transition to the stage without losing an ounce of narrative punch.

There's a weird relief in winter, when the wife of Tom's brother Ronnie dies. Ronnie seems like a hard man in the classic English sense - Tom's unpleasant, less educated, less intelligent flip-side. Ronnie is dumbstruck when his wife passes, as it's clear he's never done a thing for himself, a fact his very angry son brings up, even while he is late to his mother's funeral.

The awkwardness of mourning seems oddly comforting: Death comes to the well-adjusted and the baffled alike. There are brilliant moments between Mary and Ronnie, as she all but hijacks his extreme mourning. Even Ronnie, nearly mute in his shock, recognizes that Mary is more messed up and reacts with a kindness that doesn't seem to come from a place of superiority.

In the end, life simply continues, and nobody seems to learn a thing, least of all Mary, whose final scene is a study in frustration and sadness. The crushing disappointment of everyday life weighs on her the most. She cannot figure it out, hers or anyone else's, and you can't help but feel bad for her, even as you want to hit her with a hammer.

We all know someone like that. We all know someone like everyone in "Another Year." Like our real-life relationships, we get out of it what we bring to it, no more and no less.

"Another Year"

Our grade: A-

Genres: Comedy, Drama

Running Time: 129 min

MPAA rating: PG-13