The Father: Movie Review

The Father: Film Review

Cast: Sir Anthony Hopkins, Olivia Colman, Rufus Sewell, Imogen Poots, Olivia Williams, Mark Gatiss

Director: Florian Zeller

Adapted from his own play, Florian Zeller's take on dementia is a slow-burn of a perverse psychological thriller that's steeped in its own humanity, and is content to rip the rug from under your feet without a moment's notice. 

Hopkins plays Anthony, an elderly man seemingly living alone in a flat in the twilight of his life. The film begins with his daughter Anne (the ever-brilliant Colman, mixing both glum, anger and fear with equal aplomb) returning to the flat, to be greeted with her father asking why she had come there.

A relatively familiar conversation plays out, as Anthony dismisses the need for a carer, and a loving daughter pushes down the growing frustration at her father's indignance and apparently obstreperous stubborn wish to be left alone.

But as Anne says she's thinking of moving, Anthony's eyes well with tears and a little voice decries, almost pathetically,"What's going to become of me....?"

Seconds later, Zeller has taken an ordinary scene and without warning ripped the rug from under the viewers' eyes with a visual trick that's too spoilery to divulge - and a clever touch on the topic of dementia.

As The Father plays out, it seems it's that of an unreliable narrator, and of shifting timelines, and cracks in psyches - in many ways, it feels like a detective film as you try to piece the ends together, make sense of the puzzle and gradually get your head around this Memento-filtered dementia tale that has echoes of Michael Haneke's Amour.

And yet, for all the narrative trickery, and the scene shifts which demand your attention, there is a very human story playing out here, anchored by two phenomenal performances from Hopkins and Colman.

Hopkins easily delivers a masterclass in acting, turning from frailty to righteous anger, via impish charisma - his opening moments set the stall out, as he navigates the peaks and troughs of the emotion and depth needed with ease. For a character suffering with dementia, Hopkins, ironically, brings a lucidity to the role that's clear, concise and razor sharp in its execution.

But equally his peer - and in a more understated and subtle way - is Colman. Her Anne is every dutiful son or daughter who ever did negotiate the ravages of the end of life, and her every facial expression is a deft touch, designed to crack open her fragile state of mind. As usual, Colman steals moments with just a few words or one look.

Zeller may be accused of trying to be too smart for his own good with The Father, but shorn of the timeline jumps and starts, as the film sheds its layer upon layer, it reveals its poignancy and simplicity of devastation.

Hopkins and Colman may indeed destroy you with their masterful performances, but combined with the clever use of lighting, subtle differences in the the decor and the wide frame usage, the film draws you in on many levels - before delivering one final utterly devastating gut punch, so familiar and so awful to so many.