To Live ( Spoilers)

 I studied Akira Kurosawa’s film Ikiru at University so I was intrigued to see how the melancholic Katuzo Ishiguro would recreate it in this much lauded remake. Interestingly the film is set in the 1950s as Ikiru was, so from the get go, it had turned the tables on the original which had a great deal to say about the modern Japan.

I had been making notes in my head when I was sat with my laptop in the Storyhouse Cafe, sipping a pretentious orange hot chocolate 

There are perhaps eighty people in the public space here. 

A baby and toddler group has just finished a fairly low key and sweet clap a long to You are my sunshine my only Sunshine as the waitresses weave in and out of the tables mostly filled with people studying or working on line. 

Tom Burke 

Living as it turned out, is a beautifully crafted and elegant piece of filmmaking which perfectly captures the stuffiness of post war Britain. It centres upon Mr Williams, a tight, self contained widower who rules his civil servant office with a quiet , almost silent whisper. Nicknamed Mr Zombie by junior clerk Miss Harris ( the doe eyed Aimee Lou Wood) he has no friends of note and returns home each night to a an ungrateful son and his ambitious and money needy wife.

It is an existence, nothing really more, and when Mr Williams finds out he has months to live, he suddenly embarks on a journey towards acceptance by learning to live again.

Aimee Lou Wood

Bill Nighy, breaks your heart in a simple look . 

His lugubrious face perfectly captures the look of a man who hasn’t lived the life he expected and he’s at his most moving when he’s saying very little at all.

You just feel , his pain, 

Plain and simple.

And it is that which is the power of this film as writer Ishiguro and director Oliver Hermanus lead Mr Williams into connections with a whole group of characters who immediately empathise with him and his situation and whose reactions break your heart all over again .

Tom Burke a drunk writer  ,who takes Mr Williams on an impromptu pub crawl is moved to tears when he witnesses the older man singer a Scottish lullaby from his youth and a beat  policeman ( Thomas Coombes) is affected almost in a spiritual way when he finally witnesses Mr Williams enjoying the fruits of his work labours in the construction of a child’s playground in the slum area of London.

It’s a sad, but gently optimistic film which has a great deal to say , not only about living….but about empathy

I drove  home with radio turned off

And thought about what I’ve just witnessed 

It’s winter tonight and my joints are aching 

I made beef stew and dumplings for supper