In this age of fairly mindless actioneers, it is nice to see that there can be a film that slows down and portrays normal people. A movie for adults about adults that has real quality. Philomena is a nice, simply-stated film about an ordinary woman in extraordinary circumstances.
The film, based on a true story, starts with the protagonist, Philomena Lee played by Dame Judi Dench, a young woman in 1950's Ireland who meets an attractive young man at a fair. The course of nature takes over and she becomes pregnant. This causes her father to banish her from the house into a convent where she is forced to have her child (breech-birthed without an aesthetic as penance for her sin) and work in the convent for four years to pay back the debt, in what could be fairly described as being in prison. The mothers were allowed to see their children once a day for one hour. It turns out the convent would sell the children for adoption to rich couples, many of the from overseas. Her child is taken away to America, and for the next 50 years, she has wondered about his fate. Finally, in a state of melancholy, Philomena tells her daughter about the existence of her half-brother. Her daughter contacts a reporter who takes on the human-interest story, and the rest of the movie is the adventure they have trying to find the fate of this man.
This movie has a lot of depth and there is a lot going on. Philomena is a deeply religious Catholic who has been deeply wronged by the church in a day when morality was much stricter more rigid. It is a movie of loss, anger, despair and forgiveness, all of which are subtly, but unmistakenly etched on Judi Dench's face. This is not a movie with dramatic shouting and confrontation, but rather quiet revelations, reflection and determination. I have never seen a performance quite like it. We are used to the bombastic performances of Brando, Pacino, Nicholson and Washington as our yardsticks of what is dramatic range. But the Brits have something to teach us in the art of subtlety, of illicting a performance, not banging you over the head with it. Maybe it is that stiff upper lip thing, but in a medium where the close up can speak volumes, this is the type of performance that should be lauded and copied. Philomena is perfectly written. She is witty, yet a little dotty. An old lady that is not worldly, but is quite wise and very likeable. It is deliberately paced (read slow), giving us detail after detail gradually. This is definitely not the movie for the post-MTV, ADD generation. They will be whining "I'm bored!" in the first ten minutes. But for those who like an intimate story well-told, this is the movie for you.
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