Never Let Me Go is perhaps the most sadly overlooked picture of 2010. While I doubt any of the three performances were worthy of an Academy Award Nomination but the film as a whole deserved more notice than it received at the box office. With life now on DVD and Blu-ray, I think it’s certainly worth giving a try especially if you liked dramas such as Atonement.
Never Let Me Go (2010)
Genre(s): Drama, Romance
Fox | R – 104 min. – $39.99 | February 1, 2011
MOVIE INFO:
Directed by: Mark Romanek
Writer(s): Kazuo Ishiguro (novel); Alex Garland (screenplay)
Cast: Carey Mulligan, Andrew Garfield, Keira Knightley
Theatrical Release Date: September 15, 2010
DISC INFO:
Features: Featurettes, Artwork Galleries
Number of Discs: 1
Audio: English (DTS-HD MA 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 5.1), Portuguese (Dolby Digital 5.1), Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1)
Video: 1080p/Widescreen 2.35
Subtitles: English SDH, Cantonese, Chinese, Portuguese, Spanish
Disc Size: 39.9 GB
Codec: AVC
Region(s): A,B
THE MOVIE – 4.5/5
Note: This portion of the review does contain spoilers so if you have any interest in seeing the film, please skip this section.
Never Met Me Go is a poignant drama-romance from director Mark Romanek making his big screen return since 2002’s drama, One Hour Photo featuring a creepy but incredible performance from Robin Williams. With his latest, Romanek employs the same type of quiet and surreal atmosphere to tell a story that is slow to develop yet is still deeply moving, one of the most emotionally impactful films of 2010 in fact.
The story is based upon a novel by Kazuo Ishiguro and centers friends Kathy, Tommy and Ruth who attend an English boarding school called Hailsham that is there to teach special children with great talents. The children seem to be well adjusted but throughout the first part of the film – split into three parts of their lives – you get the sense that there’s something off. This is confirmed when one of their new guardians/teachers reveals that while in the rest of the world people have jobs or higher aspirations, these kids were made for one purpose: their organs. She explains that they exist only to grow up to a certain point after which they go through one or several “donations” until their body can no longer sustain itself.
During this period, the reserved Kathy and creatively challenged Tommy develop a crush for one another but it is Ruth who takes the step to actually date Tommy during their adolescent years up through their next step in their short lives.
The film then takes us from their childhood days at Hailsham to the “Cottages”, residential complexes where the donors can roam freely and mingle with the outside world. It’s during this time that the now young adult Kathy (CAREY MULLIGAN), Tommy (ANDREW GARFIELD) and Ruth (KEIRA KNIGHTLEY) feelings for one another come to a boil as they also explore their own origins which brings up a whole another can of worms.
In the third and final part, for which I’ll refrain from going into too much detail, they reach their final stage, the three have primarily on their separate ways but reunite, reminiscent about the past and also making amends.
I don’t want to go into too much more specificity, not so much because there’s a twist (there really isn’t) but the emotional impact of the entire film weighs on the third act and also brings forward what author Ishiguro (Remains of the Day) and screenwriter Alex Garland (Sunshine) were trying to convey. It’s not so much about the morality on cloning in fact it’s only briefly brought up nor is it about, as some who have not seen the film bring up, these characters trying to make an escape with helicopters chasing them down (The Island), but instead it’s about life itself and the choices we make… or lack thereof. The cloning aspect was the vessel Ishiguro chose to present the message, a clever method that works really well while never manipulating the audience.
Performances-wise, while Keira Knightley once again turns in a good performance (as she had in Atonement, another film I find a kinship with) and Andrew Garfield has a couple emotionally impactful and heart wrenching scenes, this is very much Carey Mulligan’s film since the entire story is told from her perspective. I haven’t seen her in too much (missed her in Wall Street 2), but I thought she delivers a subtle yet still engaging performance. For instance, there’s a scene halfway through where Kathy listening to a song and standing at her doorway is Ruth who walks in and is pretty aggressive about Kathy’s lifelong crush with Tommy and without saying a word, you can see layers of Kathy’s emotions come out to a final moment when her emotional center comes crashing down. It’s not a long scene but one that stood out.
Director Mark Romanek delivers yet another great dramatic experience, a follow-up his effectively creepy but fantastic One Hour Photo, a film that showed Robin Williams range. As for Never Let Me Go, given the subject of cloning and splitting the film into three parts, it’s a relatively simple message he, the author and the screenwriter were trying to convey; simple yet important using three characters you feel for and engage with until the very end.
SPECIAL FEATURES – 2.5/5
The Secrets of Never Let Me Go (30:10; HD) – The cast and crew discuss the movie and the novel for which it’s based on. The actors talk about their characters while the crew (including director Mark Romanek and author Kazuo Ishiguro) focuses on the challenges of adapting it into a feature film as well as talking about one another and what the other brings to the production. It then goes into the aesthetic elements from set designs to how Romanek chose to shoot the film.
Mark Romanek’s On-Set Photography (3:13), Tommy’s Art (2:35) and National Donor Programme & Hailsham Campaign Graphics (1:58) are compilation of artwork, photos/stills or graphics used throughout the film set against the brilliant score.
Theatrical Trailer (2:26; HD) is thankfully also included.
The disc also includes trailers for Conviction, Black Swan, 127 Hours and Cyrus.
VIDEO – 4.25/5
Never Let Me Go is presented in its original 2.35 widescreen aspect ratio, in 1080p high-definition on a 50GB dual layers disc. Visually the movie looks fantastic thanks for cinematographer Adam Kimmel (Capote) though it’s not a picture that will pop off the screen. That said I couldn’t really see any flaws with the transfer. The detail levels look pretty good throughout while colors have the romantic glow during certain portions, especially in the third act. Black levels meanwhile are quite good as there are a couple nighttime scenes to show off that aspect of the video.
AUDIO – 4/5
The DTS-HD MA 5.1 track isn’t anything extraordinary but provides some good depth between the dialogue which comes through the center channel, ambient noises or voices in the front and rear channels and Rachel Portman’s score from the all directions. There aren’t any action/thriller sequences so you’re not going to get an immersive experience but I thought this was an effective enough track.
OVERALL – 4.25/5
Overall, Never Let Me Go is perhaps the most sadly overlooked picture of 2010. While I doubt any of the three performances were worthy of an Academy Award Nomination but the film as a whole deserved more notice than it received at the box office nabbing a mere $2.5 million in the U.S. reaching only 178 screens at its widest release. Box office disappointment aside, with life now on DVD and Blu-ray, I think it’s certainly worth giving a try especially if you liked dramas such as Atonement. It is a quiet film and one that some may find tedious and maybe even a tad drab, but I for one loved it for the most part (as important as the early Hailsham scenes were, I prefer the second and third sections) and full-heartedly recommend it.
Brian Oliver, The Movieman
Published: 02/10/2011
Check out some more screen caps by going to page 2.