Man, I haven't connected with a film like this for a long time. I think the last time was probably Almost Famous, and I don't even particularly like 70's rock & roll. But what that film managed to capture was, essentially, my life as an awkward teenage boy, and Boyhood goes one step further to completely embody my entire childhood and adolescence.
Ellar Coltrane, the star of Richard Linklater's latest (and perhaps greatest) masterpiece, was born on August 27, 1994. I was born on July 17, 1995. This means that we would have been a year apart at school, albeit barely. And watching this film felt like, in parts, a collection of home movies from my very own coming-of-age story.
Admittedly, there are some significant differences between the life of myself and the life of Mason Jr, the film's protagonist. I never had a bratty older sister who woke me up singing Britney Spears. I grew up in a small town in Kent rather than Texas, so I never got a shotgun for my fifteenth birthday. While I grew up with my parents separated, I never had a bad experience with abusive step-dads (twice). And of course, I was never as good-looking as Coltrane, so I didn't have as much luck with girls.
But these are merely details. Where Linklater excels is in capturing the very spirit of "boyhood", the experiences felt growing up which are not as unique to us as we might think. Mason's journey from naive child, lying on the grass staring dreamily up at the clouds, to pretentious young adult, ranting about the NSA as if he's the first person to do so, rings perfectly true. Who didn't grow their hair long, experiment with drinking, or have their friends taken away, either by adults who didn't understand or who were powerless to do anything?
The main draw of this film is that filming took place over 11 years, dropping in and out at key moments in Mason's growing-up process. To a cynic it might sound like a gimmick, a gimmick which has been done before by Michael Apted with his Up series and François Truffaut with his collaboration with Jean-Pierre Léaud. But never before have we seen actors age in front of our very eyes over the course of one film, at least not on this grand a scale. Linklater had the impossible task of casting a child who would grow up to become a good actor, and he somehow succeeded with Coltrane. While the plot is fictional, I would imagine much of the scenarios came about organically, since he gives such a naturalistic and likeable performance it's hard sometimes to remember he's acting. He could well be your child - he's honest, funny, frustrating at times but always good-natured - and by the end of the film it's likely you'll feel that same paternal bond.
The supporting players are fantastic, too. Ethan Hawke, whose aging process parallels the real-life transition he made from cocky Training Day underling to mature Before Midnight leading man, is excellent, and I saw so much of my own father within his character - also a tortured creative type with a penchant for the Beatles, though one without a job at an insurance company. And Patricia Arquette steals the show by giving the most quietly dignified and best performance of her career, with the scene where she cries as she sends her son to college hitting a bit too close to home.
The universal appeal of this film has brought on an astonishing wave of positive criticism if the Rotten Tomatoes scores are anything to go by, a rarity even with a project as ambitious as this. It feels like the kind of film which Roger Ebert would have raved about, much like he did with The Tree of Life and Synedoche, New York, because it's ambitious and exhibits a deeply abiding love for life itself. It's also the masterwork of an already talented artist - I've been a fan of Richard Linklater since I saw Before Sunrise late at night on a television with dodgy colour resolution, and it's only grown from there (A Scanner Darkly was, for a time, my favourite film, in spite of its flaws). But Boyhood is the absolute pinnacle of his creative talent, the product of eleven years of effort and ingenuity. And for what it is, it's perfect.
★★★★★
