We Need To Talk About Kevin Review

Nearly a decade after her astonishingly assured debut Ratcatcher and its enigmatic follow-up Morvan Caller, acclaimed British filmmaker Lynne Ramsey has made a striking return to screens with an adaptation of the controversial 2003 bestseller by Lionel Shriver. It comes after a failed attempt by Ramsey to bring another bestseller, The Lovely Bones, to the big screen. However futile that effort may have been Ramsey need not worry for where Peter Jackson’s adaptation of that story was met with a lukewarm reception, We Need To Talk About Kevin was regarded as one of the highlights of this year’s Cannes Film Festival and is being poised for awards glory with very good reason indeed.

The ever watchable Tilda Swinton plays the central character of Eva, a former travel writer introduced to us crowd surfing along at Valencia’s La Tomatina festival. Her face drenched in red and euphoria she lies with her arms outstretched in a Christ like pose, a grimly ironic foreboding of the hardships she will come to endure. We next meet Eva confronted by another incarnation of red; paint splattered across her crummy bungalow by a vengeful community who also glare at her in the street, openly threaten her and at one point physically assault her. It is clear that they hold her responsible for a heinous crime committed by her teenage son Kevin (Ezra Miller). He is only a child so the parent must surely be responsible right? Wallowing in self guilt, Eva remembers back to her relationship with husband to be Franklin (John C. Reilly), the birth of Kevin and their seemingly unavoidable resentment of one another as she wrestles with the difficult question: Was Kevin’s crime an act of nature or nurture?
Taking a hammer to Shriver’s literary device of Eva’s letters to an estranged Franklin, Ramsey and fellow screenwriter Rory Kinnear offer up a fractured progression of Eva’s downfall. She initially appears every bit the victim of a thoroughly unpleasant child with a thousand yard stare that would unnerve Damien. Kevin seems to take an instant resentment to his mother, refusing to communicate with her and rebuking her attempts at motherly love at each turn. Yet as the blanks are steadily filled in Eva’s saintly nature quickly dissolves. She clearly resents Kevin for the end of her outgoing life and directs her anger at him in increasingly irresponsible ways from cruel baby talk (‘Mommy was happy before you came along!’) to an unforgivable loss of temper resulting in injury.

Ramsay observes the family tug of war with increasingly unnerving close ups, most noticeably of her actors’ faces and minuet details of Eva’s ever increasing sense of social entrapment. Repeated shots of characters eating take on a strange and otherworldly effect as though we’re prying into an intensely private act. The colour red becomes increasingly clear in the frame as events progress, representing both Kevin’s impending crime and Eva’s guilt. At one point there is an incredibly blunt shot of her washing blood from a sink with her bare hands. Such symbolism could be too unsubtle for its own good where it not so tremendously uncomfortable and frightening, a feeling accentuated by Jonny Greenwood’s score whose fractured creeping tones accompanied last decade’s masterpiece There Will Be Blood. Nearly every scene is laced with a fascinating combination of familiarity and utter dread. Working closely with cinematographer Seamus McGarvey, Ramsey isolates Eva within the frame of domestic docility making her world appear ever more large and alone, building surely but steadily to a shattering climax.

Swinton is magnificent as Eva pulling off a delicate tightrope act of making us sympathetic towards Eva whilst still boldly acknowledging her shortcomings as a mother. She commands with the simplest of expressions including one devastating moment when on the brink of emotional recovery she is rebuffed by a drunken work colleague. Yet despite all of the indignity Eva must endure, Swinton never lets the emotional dam break. It could have been easy to have the big break down, to cry out all the guilt and pent up feeling yet Swinton refuses to play it that way making the scenario all the more believable and dramatic particularly with her scenes opposite John C. Reilly. Still best known for some admirable yet unremarkable comedy films, Reilly continues to establish himself as one of America’s finest character actors bringing a haunting tragedy to what could have been a bland stock role of the clueless husband. For all of Swinton and Reilly’s gravitas through, the film belongs to Ezra Miller as the teenage Kevin. Disconcertingly charming and handsome yet cold and innocent, Miller perfectly sells the idea of American youth gone horribly wrong yet refuses to pinpoint the exact cause of Kevin’s horrific actions. It’s a terrific play on both part of the performers and filmmakers.

Ultimately We Need To Talk About Kevin confronts issues that will be challenging for mainstream audiences and touches on the frightening idea of things that go unsaid between parents and children. It’s reflection of a post Columbine era America never feels forced or phony despite the incredible stylistic flourishes and symbolism. It’s certainly not an easy watch but it’s near impossible to ignore or overlook. Hopefully come the awards season, people will still be talking about Kevin.

Magazine Round-Up Part 2: Rihanna Takes Vogue Cover

British Vogue has Rihanna on the cover. She is interviewed inside and says ‘Whatever my mojo tells me, that’s what I’m going to do’.

Tilda Swindon is interviewed.

Scion of the fashion dynasty Maxmara, Maria Giulia Prezioso Maramotti is interviewed by Vogue and she tells them that ‘my mother impressed on me that to be elegant you have to avoid overdressing’.

Articles on Coco Chanel, Jean-Paul Goude, Bryce Dallas Howard on her, and her characters, style, director Martina Amati, Sylvia Plath’s daughter Frieda Hughes, Dolores and Carmen Chaplin, Miss V covers Mark Ronsons wedding, David and Serena Linley, Hannah Rothschild on Leonardo da Vinci, the new breed of entrepreneurs, Vogue dons white coats and learned how to give good facials, Norma Kamali – and doesn’t she look amazing! Katie Holmes gives her Style File.

Most magazines this month had at least one article on perfume.

There is a rise in vegetarians, but Vogue has a good article on people rediscovering meat.

Marie Claire has Reese Witherspoon on the cover. ‘I didn’t realise how anxious I was about being a single parent’ she tells Marie Claire.

There is a new column from writer Lindsay Kelk; a Northern lass turned New York singleton who will be charting her journey to find Mr Right.

Marie Claire reports on a beauty pageant for men to become the cover stars of romance novels, yes, really.

There is a really good article on the inspirational Mary Portas. Make your wardrobe fashion editor fabulous. Jamie Oliver, Are you the new Type A? , DNA Dating, Is it time for a career shuffle?, Martin Daubney gives it all up to become a full-time father, Dolly Parton, Gossip Girl Stylist Eric Daman, Tali Lennox, Nicole Roberts.

My life in books by Caroline Aherne.

Lionel Shriver, Rachel Evan Woods, perfume, save your skin facials, Christina Aguilera, curb your cravings. 12 reasons you’re tired all the time, Pixie Lott’s food heaven.

Marie Claire have a special sex section, ahem. No comment from me.

Vanity Fair has Johnny Depp on the cover. ‘Basically if they’re going to pay me the stupid money, I’m going to take it’ he says.

Florence Welch, Mario Batali, Amber Heard, Bobbi Brown, Tinie Tempah, Moby Dick, The Tea Party, Tailor’s Anderson and Sheppard, Marisa Berenson, Haruki Murakami, Michael Lewis asks if California will sink the US, Elisabeth Warren, gossip columnist Liz Smith, Milton Gendal, Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher, Courtney Love unravels, Woody Allen, Ethan Coen, Elaine May, Desmond Tutu.

There is a free supplement: Vanity Fair On Couture with Rebecca Hall on the cover. Catherine Middleton is on their best dressed, Giorgio Armani, Nicky Haslam, Giambattista versus Azzedine Alaia, Karl Lagerfield, Chanel, Ann Bonfoey Taylor, Elie Saab, Daphne Guinness, Amanda Harlech, Lucy Birley.