We Need To Talk About Kevin
5 out of 5
There’s a moment after the birth of a child when the mother gazes into the eyes of her newborn and forges a connection – a love – that will last two lifetimes. The child might mess up, a little or a lot, somewhere down the road, and the mother might not always be at her most maternal, but this is a love that is indestructible, eternal and automatic. That last world is probably the most important. Automatic. This love isn’t something that has to be worked or developed. It’s just there, naturally, from the very beginning. Or, it should be. “We Need to Talk About Kevin” is about what happens when it isn’t.
For whatever reason, Eva Khatchadourian and her son Kevin don’t connect, and didn’t even in his infancy. And then, fifteen or so years into his life, he locks a handful of students into his high school gym and shoots them down. Are the two connected? Director Lynne Ramsay, adapting the movie from the acclaimed novel of the same name, isn’t generous enough to answer that question outright, but the sprawling psychological narrative she constructs around it is far more fascinating and enthralling than a straight answer ever could be.
As Eva reels from the upending of her life and tries to reconstruct some semblance of happiness and stability, and as the film flashes back to times before the incident, the viewer is treated to a veritable wonder of visual filmmaking. Too few directors these days, I feel, take full advantage of the medium of film as primarily a seen art form – one enjoyed by the eyes – but, luckily, Ramsay is one of those few. And I’m not just talking about making movies that are pretty; I’m talking about movies that are pretty and for a reason. Every single frame of “We Need to Talk About Kevin” suffused with Ramsay’s customarily bold visual style, soaking in meaning and panache.
And for all the visual intrigue, she doesn’t skimp on story either. Avoiding the traditional, point-A-to-point-B, chronological way of ordering events, Ramsay skips around between present and past in a manner more fit to the psychological nature of the narrative. As the guilt-ridden are wont to do, Eva, in her mind, goes back and forth throughout her memory, trying to find all the answers, and where her mind goes, the camera follows. The end product is a thrilling and fascinating, if gloomy, account of, well, almost everything. Guilt, love, redemption, disappointment, regret, anger, courage, rebellion, life and loss.
But even as good as this film is at its core, as strong as its direction and cinematography and script are, I don’t think it could have succeeded without Tilda Swinton in the lead role. This might sound like hyperbole, but it isn’t. Eva is potentially a very unlikable character. A mother who doesn’t love her son. Is there anything more taboo than that? More despicable? And yet, Swinton is able, somehow (don’t ask me how), to make Eva respectable and honest and dignified, if not exactly likable. You might hate some of the things Eva has done, but you don’t hate Eva. And young actor Ezra Miller does very much the same thing with Kevin, who is menacing and acerbic but also charming and intelligent.
Ultimately, I was rendered speechless at the end of “We Need to Talk About Kevin,” and for several reasons. I was rendered almost numb by the subject matter, deep and serious and sobering, and I was also so enamored as to find difficulty verbally expressing my thoughts. You know, now that I think about it, it’s kind of unfairly ironic for a movie whose title demands conversation to be made too perfect for words to describe.
