A Single Man Review

Title: A Single Man 

Year: 2009

Director: Tom Ford

Main Actors: Colin Firth, Julianne Moore, and Matthew Goode

A Single Man takes place on a single day, the day of November 30^th 1962.  This is the day that George Falconer decides he is going to commit suicide.  George Falconer decides that he is going to put his affairs in order, so that in the evening he can kill himself.  George goes through his day meeting people and doing his job, all the while reminiscing about, Jim, the man he loved, who died on a visit to his family.  

Jim was everything to George and now George feels that there is no longer a point in living.  In the morning he dresses and ‘becomes the George he is meant to be.’  On November 30^th 1962, George cleans out his desk at the school where he teaches, he cleans out his safe deposit box, and he neatly arranges all of the paperwork in his home office.  However, his day does not go by without meeting people and gaining insight into his life. These people see a very, out-of the ordinary- sad man.  One of his students, Kenny Potter, takes a particular interest in the professor.  At the end of the day Kenny visits him and they go swimming.

It is at the end of the day that George finds a reason to live.  After dealing with old friends, Charley, and new, Kenny, George finds a reason to live. I think that this is where the most interesting part of the movie occurs.  In our society there are so many instances where we seek to explain death, but this movie seeks to find a reason to live. It is reversing the normal roles, because throughout history, people accepted living, but needed an explanation for death, and the media, whether it is books or movies, has offered explanations and comforts. This movie though twists that idea and shows a man who has already accepted his death, but seems to be searching for some reason to keep living.  George finds his, but this movie also points out that we cannot escape death.  The moment George accepts life, death comes and finds him anyway.  This shows a lot about the view of the purposes of life and death.  We need to have a reason to keep on living, but we also need to know that we cannot escape the grip of death.