Terence Davies Movies
British director and screenwriter Terence Davies is noted for his highly personal and often autobiographical chronicles of British working class and the struggles they face in the post-WWII world. He first gained recognition for his Terence Davies Trilogy, which is comprised of three black-and-white religious-themed short chronicles of daily life. Davies shot the films sans color because he sees great beauty and power in the stark simplicity of black-and-white imagery. He released his first feature film, Distant Voices, Still Lives, in 1988. Filmed in color, it was a disturbing account of the brutal abuse he and other family members suffered at the hands of his working-class father during the 1950s. The film also makes a striking comparison between the shiny, upbeat veneer of the decade with its happily middle-class families and firm moral values and the dark, seething realities faced by the blue-collar laborers struggling to eke out a living in their shabby neighborhoods. The film earned the young director much acclaim on the international film festival circuit. Davies' next film, The Long Day Closes (1992), was also autobiographical, and earned him a similar amount of critical appreciation.Davies stuck with his familiar theme of troubled family life in his next film, 1995's The Neon Bible. Transposing his familiar backdrop of England to the rural Georgia of the 1940s, Davies' display of universal despair kept in tune with the nostalgic and strikingly visual qualities of his previous efforts, though the methodical pacing polarized audiences and critics in their response to the film. It was with House of Mirth (2000) that Davies would break tradition, moving on to a full-blown, grand-scale period romance. Though it was by definition a larger film than his previous efforts, Mirth retained the more melancholy aspects that defined his previous works, with protagonist Lilly (X-Files star Gillian Anderson in a typecast-shattering role) searching for happiness through the courting of wealthy suitors, the characterizations and harsh realities faced by Lilly were essential Davies fodder. Lush and bursting from the seams with vivid color and gorgeous cinematography, Mirth delivered Edith Wharton's study of destructively materialistic social mores to the screen with unquestionable style. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
British filmmaker Terence Davies pays homage to the city of his birth in this visual essay on the seaside town of Liverpool. Described by Davies as "a love song and a eulogy," Of Time and the City uses vintage home movies and newsreel footage to paint a portrait of the Liverpool he knew as a child, a tough working-class community where decay and resilience walked side by side, even as many of the efforts to "improve" Liverpool in the '60s accomplished little beyond robbing it of its character and rough-hewn beauty. Combining a variety of found images with music and poetry, Of Time and the City explores how this slow evolution of Liverpool impacted the people who lived there, and how the people also became part of the city's ups and downs. Of Time and the City was screened as a special presentation at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Adapted for the screen from Edith Wharton's much-loved novel of the same name, House of Mirth follows the fortunes -- or lack thereof -- of Lily Bart, an ambitious but financially imperiled young woman looking for a rich husband in early 20th century New York. The story opens as Lily (Gillian Anderson) takes tea at the apartment of Lawrence Selden (Eric Stoltz), a young bachelor lawyer to whom Lily is attracted but cannot marry because he is not wealthy enough for her liking. Lily stops at Selden's apartment en route to Bellomont, where she is planning to husband-hunt at the country home of shifty businessman Gus Trenor (Dan Aykroyd) and his wife. Gus agrees to invest some money for Lily, but his intentions toward her quickly turn carnal, and when she rebuffs his advances, she finds herself $9,000 in debt. Help arrives in the form of financier Sim Rosedale (Anthony LaPaglia), who extends to Lily a businesslike proposition of marriage; though she is tempted, Lily refuses his offer because he is nouveau riche rather than blueblood society. Soldiering on, Lily journeys to the Mediterranean, where she has been invited to the home of Bertha Dorset (Laura Linney), an alpha socialite who schemes to use Lily as an unwitting decoy for an affair under the nose of her husband George (Terry Kinney). When the trip starts to go bad, George tells Lily that he wants to divorce the slatternly Bertha, but needs some solid proof of her affairs in order to do so. Lily knows that one of Bertha's previous lovers was Selden, but her loyalty to him prevents her from speaking up to George. So, still in debt to Gus and given only a paltry inheritance by her aunt (Eleanor Bron), Lily endures a slew of unsuccessful jobs and, tragically, gradually sinks into the mire of genteel poverty. Directed by Terence Davies, House of Mirth premiered at the 2000 Locarno Film Festival. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gillian Anderson, Eric Stoltz, (more)
- 1995
- NR
A young boy comes of age in rural Georgia during the 1940s in Terence Davies' challenging, visually powerful drama. Acclaimed for his nostalgic, beautifully photographed reflections on England's past (The Long Day Closes, Distant Voices, Still Lives), Davies looks beyond his home country to America with this adaptation of a novel by John Kennedy Toole, author of A Confederacy of Dunces. The film is told through the eyes of David (Jacob Tierney), a teenage boy struggling to deal with life in a troubled family. He reflects on his youthful experiences of his father (Denis Leary), an abusive, impoverished worker who disappeared during World War II after enlisting in the army. David is left to care for his increasingly unstable mother (Diana Scarwid) with the help of his Aunt Mae (Gena Rowlands), a lively big band singer. With David's recollections making up the loose plot, The Neon Bible stresses memorably intense images over narrative momentum, with cinematographer Michael Coulter creating sharp, painterly compositions. Some viewers will likely be frustrated by the slow pace and elliptical style, though others may be transfixed by the often stunning photography and poetic approach. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gena Rowlands, Jacob Tierney, (more)
- 1992
- PG
Terence Davies' blissful, evocative and non-narrative follow-up to his Distant Voices, Still Lives follows a few months in the life of 12-year-old Bud (Leigh McCormack), in impressionistic snatches of his everyday existence growing up in the Liverpool of 1956. Bud's world is influenced by his mother (Marjorie Yates), his older sister Helen (Ayse Owens), and his older brothers John (Nicholas Lamont) and Kevin (Anthony Watson). Bud is a lonely and quiet child whose moments of solace occur when he sits in rapture at the local cinema, watching towering and iconic figures on the movie screen. The movies give Bud the strength to get through another day as he deals with his oppressive school environment and his burgeoning homosexuality. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Marjorie Yates, Leigh Mc Cormack, (more)
- 1988
- PG13
Set in 1940s England, Distant Voices/Still Lives is a compassionate look at a radically dysfunctional family. The son and his mother must endure the casual and overt cruelties of the bull-necked father. The ongoing abuse takes its toll in the form of failed marriages and misguided attempts at seeking security outside the family unit. As was the case with his earlier short subject trilogy (The Children, Madonna and Child, Death and Transfiguration), director Terence Davies based much of the material on his own life, combining rheumy-eyed cynicism with soft-edged nostalgia (the musical track, drawn from popular wartime songs, is particularly evocative). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Freda Dowie, Pete Postlethwaite, (more)
- 1984
In this downbeat trilogy on the life and times of a man who had every reason to be depressed, director Terrence Davies has delivered a fascinating but decidely miserable 94 minutes. The first segment relates little Robert Tucker's days walled up in a tough, unsentimental boys' school, or at home with parents who are alternately violent or callous, and have no discernible redeeming qualities. When his father dies, Robert is still wracked by grief - perhaps the loss of the hope of love was too final to bear. In the next vignette, Robert has a nowhere job in a foreboding office environment. He still lives at home with his mother, and faces his own personal and emotional issues in silence. In the final segments, flashbacks and flash forwards show Tucker remembering his childhood and life, as an old man in a sterile hospital. With a hard-hitting emotional punch, this trilogy is effective cinema - but many viewers surely would have preferred some color to balance the unremitting gray tones of the story. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Wilfrid Brambell, Sheila Raynor, (more)
- 1981
- PG
This teen comedy/drama, set in a Canadian boarding school, is about growing up while being thrown together in school rooms and residences. Conflicts and passions arise as the teens try to handle issues like a mother dying of cancer, prejudice, the agony of physical "defects," and other more or less debilitating problems. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Colin Skinner, Andrew Sabiston, (more)
