Philomena
Released: November 27th, 2013
Watched: January 27th, 2014
My Rating: 7/10 stars
Starring:
Judi Dench and Steve Coogan
Director:
Stephen Frears
The only thing I knew before I saw this movie, was the general premise. A woman looks for a son who was adopted many years ago.
Philomena Lee (Dench) is woman, whom 50 years earlier, gave birth to a son. When her father had found out about the pregnancy, he dropped her off at an abbey with nuns (scary ass nuns if you ask me). She and the other young mothers in residence there were only allowed to see their children for one hour a day. This of course was the highlight of their day, which was otherwise filled with hard labor to cover the costs of the birth and living expenses.
One day a couple arrives to adopt her best friend's daughter (the daughter was also very close to her son, Anthony). When the couple met the girl (Mary) they noticed how close the two children were, and ended up adopting both children.
Philomena was not happy (very very opposite of happy) with this and became devastated after her son was taken away.
Cut to fifty years later, Phil finally confesses to her daughter that she had another child.
In walks a political reporter, Martin Sixsmith. Martin had a career working with the BBC until a he said - she said ruined him professionally.
Phil's daughter convinces him to help tell her mother's story and help look for Anthony.
Philomena is what you would call a wonderfully sweet old woman. She doesn't yell, and tries to look on the bright side of everything. Martin, on the other hand, he's the honest one who asks the questions she wouldn't, and shows outrage, which she wouldn't.
Without ruining the rest of the story, they embark on a journey to find Philomena's son. They travel to Ireland, and the US. Martin - using all of his connections to search everywhere an answer may be. They each learn from one another along the way (as a good story should have). If you want to know what happens - go see it!
My hopes were set pretty high for this movie due to the fact that everyone said how wonderful it was. It was a great movie, don't get me wrong, but it wasn't the best movie I have seen this season. Dench was adorably charming, and Martin was the one us Americans would relate to.
And, if you want to learn about the real story (warning - it tells what happens in the end) you can read about it here.
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| Steven Coogan (Martin) and the real Philomena Lee |
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| Coogan and Dench, the real Martin Sixsmith and Philomena |
Side Note:
I went to see this with my Liz friend. We were most definitely the youngest people there by at least 30 years. Now, I'm not sure where I got this idea, but when a movie theater is relatively empty, you should always leave a space between yourself and the next group of people. At least, that's how I handle it. Well, this extremely old lady decided she wanted to sit directly next to Liz (where her coat was). Okay - we can deal (or she can, I wouldn't have handled it as gracefully as Liz). But this lady had the WORST gas ever in such a public area. It was gross, and Liz was glad that she wasn't the only one who noticed.
There was one other couple in our row - I assume they were married. Well the old man was basically deaf. Kept saying "What?" every few minutes. At one point, he said "What?" after everyone laughed. This was right after Judi Dench said something along the lines of "I never even knew I had a clitoris". His wife proceeded to yell the word "clitoris" at him until she finally just said "Shut Up!". Don't they make audio hearing devices for people who have a hard time hearing? It would have saved me from hearing the old lady yelling clitoris repeatedly.
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