The Mother (2003/I)

Director:

Roger Michell

Writer:

Hanif Kureishi (writer)

Release Date:

9 October 2003 (Germany)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Tagline:

It can take a lifetime to feel alive.

Plot:

A grandmother has a passionate affair with a man half her age, who is also sleeping with her daughter.

Plot Keywords:

Topless Female Nudity | Loss Of Husband | Mother Daughter Relationship | Heart Attack | Death Of Husband

Awards:

Nominated for BAFTA Film Award. Another 1 win & 11 nominations

Cast

Anne Reid	...	May
Peter Vaughan	...	Toots
Anna Wilson-Jones	...	Helen
Daniel Craig	...	Darren
Danira Govich	...	Au Pair
Harry Michell	...	Harry
Rosie Michell	...	Rosie
Izabella Telezynska	...	Polish Cleaner
Steven Mackintosh	...	Bobby
Cathryn Bradshaw	...	Paula
Carlo Kureishi	...	Jack
Sachin Kureishi	...	Jack
Simon Mason	...	Man in Tate Gallery
Oliver Ford Davies	...	Bruce
Jonah Coombes	...	Estate Agent

MPAA:

Rated R for sexual content including graphic images of sexuality, language and brief drug use.

Runtime:

112 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Mexico:C (cinema release) | Iceland:12 | Malaysia:(Banned) | Australia:MA | Canada:14A | Czech Republic:18 | Finland:K-15 | Germany:12 | Ireland:18 | Italy:VM14 | Netherlands:12 | New Zealand:R16 | Portugal:M/16 | Singapore:R21 | Spain:18 | Sweden:11 | Switzerland:16 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:16 (canton of Vaud) | UK:15 | USA:R | South Korea:18

Filming Locations:

British Airways London Eye, South Bank, London, England, UK

Company:

BBC Films

Trivia:

May mentions that her daughter's flat is located on Benbow Road. This is the name of the real street in London where the location of the daughter's flat is situated.

Goofs:

Crew or equipment visible: When Darren and Toots are discussing cricket, the reflections of crew equipment and the camera dolly mount are visible in the glass of the sunroom windows.

Quotes:

May: Oh, Darren. This cigarette's making my chest all congested. I can't breathe.
Darren: What would happen if you did breathe?
May: I'd say, would you... would it be too much trouble... spare rooms... would you come to the spare rooms with me... would you...

Movie Connections:

Features "The Good Life" (1975)

Painfully real

Of all the films I have seen this year (2004), none has affected me as deeply and personally as "The Mother", and on so many levels.

For one thing, watching May deal with the grief and loss and sudden disorientation of widowhood, I could not help wondering how my own mother will cope when the time comes, as it surely must, for her and indeed for all of us.

But, as May's story unfolded, it was my own sense of grief and loss and disorientation that I experienced anew. May and I share something in common: not widowhood, but age, or rather the loss of youth, and the invisibility and untouchability that come with age.

I could relate to May's need for passion, her need to be loved, her need, not so much for sex, but simply to be touched. But as we grow older, we are ironically shut out and shunted aside and denied the very thing our souls cry out for. (Note: There are some disturbing and shocking images of sexuality in "The Mother", but don't let them put you off and blind you to the real message of the film.)

May, at least, rediscovers another passion within -- to create art -- and so is able to live again. Not all of us are so fortunate. In this respect, I identify more with May's daughter Paula who, when love and passion fail and die, feels that her creative expression is no longer valid and worthwhile, and destroys her works in a fit of despair.

May is a woman in her late 60s; I am a gay man in my late 40s. Yet our stories are similar in so many ways. What May experiences in a matter of weeks, I have felt over the past decade. My passion has yet to be rediscovered.

It is no accident that "The Mother" was scripted by Hanif Kureishi, who gave us "My Beautiful Laundrette", a love story about two gay men in the flower of youth. "The Mother" is at the other end of the spectrum, a story about age and the denial of passion. To paraphrase the title of another Kureishi film, "The Mother" might aptly be titled "Sammy and Rosie Get Old".