LIVING (12A)
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REVIEWS BY DAMON SMITH
A TERMINALLY ill man acknowledges the emptiness of his existence just before it is cruelly snatched from him in director Oliver Hermanus’s exquisite English-language remake of Akira Kurosawa’s 1952 drama Ikiru.
Relocated from post-war Japan to London by Nobel and Booker Prizewinning novelist and screenwriter Kazuo Ishiguro (The Remains Of The Day), Living wreaks emotional devastation in the lingering silences between characters who have kept calm and carried on since the Second World War.
Those moments when the right words do not materialise – between a dying father and his clueless son, between sharp-suited civil servants at the mercy of bureaucratic red tape – are heartbreaking, and Hermanus allows us the time and space to feel each desolating blow.
A career-best central performance from Bill Nighy, who will be a formidable contender for Best Actor at next year’s Oscars, galvanises every elegantly crafted scene.
He delivers a mesmerising masterclass in painfully quiet servitude tinged with regret.
Touching interludes with co-star Aimee Lou Wood’s work colleague, one of the few people to know his medical diagnosis and witness a renewed resolve in the shadow of death, glister like perfectly polished gemstones.
Widowed bureaucrat Mr Williams (Nighy) diligently shuffles papers at County Hall, overseeing public works alongside Mr Middleton (Adrian Rawlins), Mr Rusbridger (Hubert Burton), Mr Hart (Oliver Chris), Ms Harris (Wood) and new arrival Mr Wakeling (Alex Sharp).
A medical check-up reveals a diagnosis of terminal stomach cancer and once Mr Williams finally whispers the dreaded words aloud (“The doctor has given me six months... eight or nine at a stretch”), he seeks peace by personally championing plans for a children’s playground.
Living is a magnificent meditation on mortality that savours every second of the 102-minute running time.
Nighy delicately plucks our heartstrings, whether he is stumbling through a booze-sodden jaunt with a sympathetic stranger (Tom Burke) or weathering awkward exchanges with his unsuspecting son (Barney Fishwick) and daughter-in-law (Patsy Ferran).
Cinema is most powerful when reality is refracted through a lens. Hermanus’s picture refuses to avert its sympathetic gaze. Life is a series of discomfiting and joyful first takes until some greater power calls “cut”.