Carol Movie Review & Film Summary (2. In 1. 94. 9, Patricia Highsmith, waiting to hear back from a publisher about a manuscript (. The book features a forbidden love story culminating in an extended . In all of her books, Highsmith was obsessed by duality, subversion and obsession. Always duality. Advertisement. Director Todd Haynes has spent a career exploring repression and conformity in films like . A lush emotional melodrama along the lines of the films of Douglas Sirk, Haynes' patron saint, .
The surfaces in . Therese (Rooney Mara) works behind the toy counter at a department store in New York City. She has a sort- of boyfriend (Jake Lacy, so good in . Then Carol, an elegant blonde, appears across the store floor (the camera floats past Carol, and then reverses back quickly: the camera version of a double- take). Their first interaction is business- like, but in reality it is a flirtatious scene, pierced with the thrill of danger. Carol invites Therese to her house in New Jersey for visits. Carol and her husband Harge (Kyle Chandler) are separated, and fighting over access to their young daughter.
When Harge starts proceedings to get sole custody, Carol whisks Therese away on an impulsive road trip, and out into America they go. The road trip is running from something and towards a place where their relationship has a possibility of existing. Haynes films all of this with his exquisite eye for detail. Production designer Judy Becker, art director Jesse Rosenthal and set decorator Heather Loeffler create various settings (crappy motel rooms, dark New York bars, Carol's home, Therese's apartment) in a way that highlight the romance and the treachery of the situation.
Carol is often about its surfaces, their beauty contrasting with the scary duality of people, relationships. The surfaces in Carol are so seductive that one. Carol is beautifully filmed, with elegant costumes, makeup and hair. The acting is superb, taking full advantage of a subtle script that allows the actors to plumb. Carol movie reviews & Metacritic score: Set in 1950s New York, two women from very different backgrounds find themselves in the throes of love. A young woman.
The color palette is a wash of light greens, deep pinks, gleaming gold, with pale tail- finned gas guzzlers roaring down empty roads. Carol and Therese are often shown staring through green- smudged or rain- streaked windows, a visual motif of their outsider status. When the film is successful it shows the loneliness of people not allowed to be who they are, although . It's more like alone- ness so acute the characters are . When intimacy finally comes, it is accompanied by loss.
First love is often like that, but in . This is due in part to the adaptation. The book is told from Therese's perspective, and because of that you are never quite sure about Carol. Therese is kept on tenterhooks: she's . In the film, there are multiple scenes where Therese is not present: Carol with her husband, talking with Abby, meetings with her lawyer. These may provide context for Carol's behavior but it also lessens the tension and creates confusion, since the majority of .
Carol, ironically, is a stronger character when seen from a distance. Advertisement. Blanchett is a naturally theatrical actress, unafraid of being .
When Carol does let down her guard, it's breathtaking because her surface is performed so flawlessly. Rooney Mara is given less to work with, mainly because Nagy's adaptation has erased Therese's backstory. In the film, Therese is from nowhere, with no family. But Mara gives Therese complexity: watch for the contrast between who she is with Carol and who she is with her merry band of male friends. This is not just the story of a shy girl coming out of her shell. Therese already lives a life that has meaning to her.
Mara's work is so touching when she shows how intimidated Therese is by Carol, how out- ranked Therese feels by this complex older woman. In one scene, Therese sits in the back seat of a taxi, watching a man and a woman walk down the sidewalk holding hands.
In 1. 96. 4, Patricia Highsmith wrote the following in her journal: It was no doubt a tragedy that I saw. Download Aida`S Secrets (2017) Movie Online. It's perhaps a tragedy I had to swallow my precious stone. At sixteen, watching careless boys and girls. Walking hand in hand down public streets,As indifferent to what people thought of them. As they were to their own sensations..
Therese, as in love as that couple on the sidewalk, cannot hold hands with Carol in public, and does not expect to ever be free like that. It is one of the most poignant moments in.