CatyAlexandre

7/10

Spoilers

Jenny is a very intelligent 16 year old girl in high school, her goal is to enter in Oxford so she is studying hard to get there. Meanwhile she meets a very charming men in his 30's, he starts to seduce her but not just her, her parents too. Her parents that once wanted her to get the best education possible are now also enchanted with this very pleasent men that seems to be the perfect future for her daughter. But things turn not to be that easy and Jenny also starts to question her goals. She is not so sure anymore about education values. I didn't know much about this story, I actually wanted to see it because of Carey Mulligan and I am for seeing it pretty much since it came out. I think she is a fine actress, liked to see her in everything she had done so far and that was the main reason. As I predicted Carey Mulligan gives a strong performance in this film, I think she is those kind of actress that does not even need to speak. She can speak through her eyes and facial expressions and she can transmit a lot to us without saying any word. The rest of the performances are all strong and it always lovely too see Emma Thompson even if it's just for a little role as a headmistress. Although this is a lovely coming-of-age story about destroyed dreams and childish fantasies of what is being an adult I thought that I would see some more depth in it and I didn't felt that certain depth in the story. Of course it has a point, a message but I was already predicting how it was going to end and what the lesson after all would be. I was always waiting for something special but nothing really different popped up. I think I would rather seen a more dramatic end and not the pretty one. Overall, An Education is not great but not bad. It's an okay story lightened by strong performances.

CinemaSerf

0/10

Sixteen year old "Jenny" (Carey Mulligan) lives with her aspiring, middle class, parents "Jack" (Alfred Molina) and "Marjorie" (Cara Seymour) whose only real desire in life is for her to study at Oxford University. This is and has been her sole focus throughout her childhood, until, that is - she encounters the dashing "David" (Peter Skarsgard). He's easily twice her age but is so much more stimulating than her schoolboy friend "Graham" (Matthew Beard). This isn't a sweep her off her feet relationship, he gradually engages her in conversation and finds they share common interests. He makes her feel special, interesting, grown up - and when he introduces her to his friends "Danny" (Dominic Cooper) and "Helen" (Rosamund Pike) she starts to feel like the proper fourth wheel on a social wagon that's truly exhilarating. Needless to say, her schoolwork starts to suffer - much to the chagrin of her teacher (Olivia Williams) and, like we all were at that age, there's no telling her that her short term path is not necessarily in her long term interests. As the film develops, we discover that though harmless enough, "David" and his pal are a pair of cads who make their living legally, but maybe just a little immorally - and when "Jenny" discovers that he has one whopping great (if predictable) skeleton in his closet, she has to put her new found maturity to good use. There's something very natural not just about Mulligan's performance here, but also about her burgeoning relationship with a man who knows just which buttons to press. He's not a nasty man, he has no agenda to get her straight into bed, indeed he seems just as dependent on having this young woman around to make him feel alive as she does him; and those characterisations proves quite effective. The star for me, though, was probably Molina. He portrays almost perfectly a father whose dreams for his daughter partnered with his own middle-class mores leaves him caught between his paternal instincts to protect his daughter and his ambitions that she live a better, more fulfilled, life than he. It does run out of steam a little at the end, but then again I'm not quite sure how I would have wanted it to conclude without copping out - one way or another, so maybe it is for the best. It looks classy, the 1960s cars, costumes and soundtrack see to that and it's well worth a watch,