Living - Film Review

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Leo Tolstoy's Death of Ivan Illych is an unflinching account of an apparently unremarkable man's encounter with his impending death. In the hands of the master, the unremarkable becomes unforgettable. Akira Kurosawa's 1952 drama Ikuru is a homage to Tolstoy, and Living is clearly influenced by both.

Set in a monochrome London of the fifties, Living portrays a still stratified society, absorbed by stultifying regimens, alienated by the concept of sharing feelings, where formal process is everything, and the slow dance of paperwork takes precedence over actually getting anything done.


Files, disputed between departments, fester in "pending" trays, where they will, it is said, "do no harm". One such file holds the fate of a project dear to some women who have the temerity to keep showing up at Mr William's department - that of creating a playground out of a bomb site.

It seems incomprehensible that these are the people who won a war and dominated an empire. It is in this stoic world that Bill Nighy's character, Mr Williams, learns that he has only months to live. Barely a flicker crosses his carefully controlled countenance as with finely calibrated politeness he takes his leave from the doctor and prepares to go home, where we meet his son and daughter-in-law who formally sit down to a meal and nothing of any substance is said.

We note a photograph of possibly happier days with a younger son and presumably Mrs Williams, about whom, apart from her absence, we are to learn absolutely nothing.

Mr Williams is next seen in a seaside boarding house, where, he tells a young man, he has gone in the consciousness that he has lived an empty life, and where he wants to have some enjoyment in his last days, only to discover that he does not know how.

Somewhat seedy nightlife does nothing for him, and he comes to the realisation that possibly making the playground project actually happen might be more satisfying.



He also encounters Miss Harris, a young woman who has joined his department. She, he feels, has not had the juices of life eviscerated from her, and he takes her to afternoon tea in an upmarket tea room, and, enjoying her company, also invites her to a Cary Grant movie. Through Miss Harris, he learns the nicknames of his colleagues - "Mr Hover", for instance, whose pen threatens to do some work, but never quite manages it. His own nickname, "Mr Zombie" causes him to smile wryly while acknowledging that it is apposite.

His interaction with the young woman is reported back to home, where the daughter-in-law thinks the worst and is horrified. Needless to say, the matter is not directly addressed. Nor does Mr Williams confide about his illness with his son, though he does tell Miss Harris, to put her fears to rest that he might have uncomfortable motives in cultivating her friendship.

Mr Williams puts his impervious persona to work to ensure that the playground paperwork gets done, to the extent of querying a Senior's blocking of the project, and sitting in another department "indefinitely" until they complete their part of the task.

The whole of the play is performed, as it were, in a minor key, and Mr William's gentle insistences have in the context the effect of an earth tremor. The playground is completed.

A film such as this needs a Bill Nighy, who can make a raised eyebrow or a gentle smile speak volumes. A sad man, aware of his limitations, nonetheless shows and receives warmth (though unfortunately not from his son) and he makes a small thing happen.

Of such, suggests this movie, consists mostly of our lives.

As Thoreau said "The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation".

And we could say of Nighy's performance "In the hands of the master the unremarkable becomes unforgettable".

We saw Living at the Dendy Coopooroo.



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