Boyhood (2014)

I watched Boyhood a couple of weeks ago with my girlfriend. It came up in conversation yesterday. She asked me if we were drunk when we watched it, because she remembers nothing about it. I reassured her that we were stone-cold sober, but I then realised that I barely remember anything about it either. Seriously, what even happened in that film? Was there an actual plot other than "young kid grows into older kid"? 

"But you're missing the point of the film! It's realism. It's depicting real life, maaaaaan." 

I (as well as the majority of the human race) watch films for two main reasons:

1. To get a couple of hours of escapism. I want to experience something extraordinary that I wouldn't normally, in my everyday life. 
2. To see interesting, complex characters reacting in their own interesting way to the real world. 

I do not, however, watch films to see normal, boring people living their normal, boring lives. I didn't care about any of the characters. None of them really had any depth beyond their familial roles. Not a single interesting event happened to warrant their dull personalities. If I wanted to experience the mundanity of real life, I wouldn't waste a tenner on a ticket in order to do so. 

"Boy" from Boyhood (I don't even remember his name) progressing from small child to edgy teen.

"But did you know that Boyhood was shot over twelve years?!"

I do appreciate that, but it's not really enough to compensate for the bad acting and seemingly empty script. Additionally, although the film was technically shot over twelve years, it was actually only three or four days of filming each year. It wasn't really enough time for the actors to gel, and it came across in their performances. For the most part, it didn't feel like a family, broken or otherwise. It felt like a few strangers reading lines of pseudo-intellectual dialogue at each other.

The impression I got from watching Boyhood was that the director gathered everyone up once a year and said, "How about we do a scene where you talk to your teacher for some inspirational words or something? That'll probably be enough content for this year," or, "What about filming you bowling again? Yes, I know we've already done that, but I'm really struggling to come up with new ideas here. Plus, the owner of the bowling alley said he'd give me free hot dogs for life if I film there again."

The whole "broken family" thing is something that's been done hundreds of times before, in films where things actually happen. Not only that, but it just seemed so amateurishly done in this film. The over-acted/under-acted delivery of the cheesy writing throughout the film just left me cringing.

The example that immediately springs to mind is the scene where the drunk stepdad stomps his way to the dinner table for a little tantrum. "ANYBODY ELSE HAVE A PROBLEM WITH ME DRINKING AT MY TABLE?!" he yelled "intimidatingly", shortly before angrily throwing his glass across the room. In my case, this is one of the few scenes that has managed to remain in my memory, just because of how awful the acting was, and how forced drama felt. It was like I was watching a terrible, low-budget soap-opera.

It was an interesting experiment in terms of filmmaking, and it had so much potential, but it's completely wasted here, simply because this movie is painfully uneventful. There's no overall story arc whatsoever. The entire film is nothing but a sequence of scenes in which nothing of value occurs. If it wasn't for the visible ageing of the characters, most of the scenes could be interchanged without make the slightest bit of difference to the "plot". 

Overall, I rate Boyhood 3/10.

I was going to give it a generous 4/10, simply for the long-term persistence of the filmmakers, but I subtracted an extra point for the kid's annoying teen facial hair. Here's a tip to any young guys reading this: if you can't grow a beard, don't grow a beard. Patchy wisps of adolescent whiskers look lame. Always have. Always will.

I'm genuinely astounded by the number of awards and nominations that this film received. I get that it's an interesting idea to see all the actors grow for twelve years before your eyes, but in my opinion, it's still just a gimmick, and not a good enough one to save this event-less film. I firmly believe that if they'd gone down the conventional route of using different actors to portray the characters at different ages, nobody would care about this film. Subtracting the gimmick, this film has very little else going for it.