Quartile rating: 8/10 · 1 rating
Set in Los Angeles in 1962, at the height of the Cuban missile crisis, is the story of a British college professor who dwells on the past and cannot see his future. We follow him through a single day, where a series of events and encounters ultimately lead him to decide if there is a meaning to life after the death of his long time partner, Jim.
A Single Man is a visually sumptuous directorial debut from Tom Ford, whose fashion background translates into an extraordinarily controlled and aestheticized cinematographic vision — color saturation shifts, extreme close-ups on textures and faces, all serving the protagonist's emotional state. Colin Firth delivers a career-defining performance as George, a man conducting his grief with quiet, devastating precision, earning his BAFTA win. The plot, adapted from Christopher Isherwood's novel, is intimate and elegiac but relatively simple — a single day in one man's life — which keeps it from scoring at the very top for narrative complexity. The ending is emotionally resonant but relies on a somewhat conventional twist that feels slightly at odds with the film's studied restraint. Novelty is solid but not exceptional; the 'single day' structure and grief narrative have precedents, though Ford's execution is distinctive and personal.