A Single Man

Lois and Kenny (Nicholas Hoult) being educated in A Single Man

A Single (and oh so gorgeous) Man is everything you would want a Christopher Isherwood adaptation to be: perfectly over-styled, performed with sublime and knowing charisma and transcending a beautifully crafted world of education, innuendos and gin.

Shot in only twenty-one days, Tom Ford has mastered the art of making each shot look like an image from a swanky coffee table photography book. Not really surprising considering his professional background as a fashion designer but what is surprising is that this high-gloss look did not, as I thought it would, feel contrived or misplaced. Ford knew the shots he wanted and knew how to get them, accurately.

Colin Firth (Pride and Prejudice, Bridget Jones’ Diary), away from the dithering Englishman we have seen before, glides through the role of George, an English professor struggling through a particular day after the death of his beloved partner of sixteen years, Jim (Matthew Goode). For a contemplative character with obvious superior intellect, bundles of humility and a child-like sense of fun, the casting of Firth was pitch-perfect. This we have, as those of you who watched the BAFTAs the other night will know, Firth’s refrigerator repair-man to thank for helping him realise this, so thank you handy-man. 

Firth’s dignified portrayal of George is partnered deliciously by Julianne Moore’s adorable performance of Charley; George’s best friend lost in a world of unrequited love, heavy eye-liner and Booker T and the MG’s. Moore’s performance, and Ford’s vision for her, has more than a nod to Liza Minelli and her Cabaret character of Sally Bowles.  As George feigns control of his emotions and prepares his pre, actual, and post-suicide he has just one last “God-damn day” to get through; a day that his mind is unusually open for and accepting of. His plans are interrupted, however, by the ultra-smooth Kenny; an over familiar, and as a result sexually irresistible, student of George’s (played with a questionable Los Angeles accent by Nicholas Holt). 

 

Charley (Julianne Moore) in A Single Man

For a film concentrating on a day in the life of its protagonist, there are sadly very few more sentences I can write that will not surely spill the gin, as it were, of this scrumptious take on Isherwood’s novella. According to Tom Ford, life for a gay English professor in his mid-thirties and living in L.A. in 1962 is swamped in glorious sun-light, dressed by the best of Rodeo Drive and so sleek and shiny I was surprised not to see reflections of the crew in any of the actor’s teeth. 

To those who may feel this film is all style over substance, I understand but I disagree. Isherwood provided the substance years ago, Ford has simply re-captured the sentiment with style and grace showcasing the wonderful human traits of hope, humour, personal acceptance and the ability to learn from those around us. As George himself masterfully says, “If it’s going to be a world with no time for sentiment…then it is not a world I want to live in.” It is also, clearly, not a world Ford had any desire to allow in his film and nor Isherwood in any of his alter-egos.

A Single Man official website

A Single Man will be showing at Broadway until Thursday 15 April.

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