I think “We Need To Talk About Kevin” would make an interesting double feature with “Rosemary’s Baby” as both serve as scary cautionary tales for prospective parents. But unlike Polanski’s classic film which dealt with the occult and supernatural, the horrors of “We Need To Talk About Kevin” are very much rooted in real life. Stories of kids going on murderous rampages at their schools have gotten far more media coverage than they deserve, but Anne Ramsay’s film is not out to exploit this subject but to explore what possibly could have triggered such a massacre. While there have been other movies like “Beautiful Boy” which show how the parents of such a kid deal with their part in such a horrific event, I doubt they are any more powerful or bleaker than this one.
Acting goddess Tilda Swinton plays Eva Khatchadourian (good luck trying to pronounce that), a successful travel writer who is picking up the pieces of her life after a tragic event people have come to blame her for. The movie shifts back and forth in time as we see her finding happiness with husband Franklin (the always great John C. Reilly) to becoming pregnant with her first child and then back to present day where Eva tries to make sense of her part in her son’s crimes. We see her as a pariah of the community, one which has people in town staring at her as if to say:
“How do you live with yourself?”
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a woman look less forward to motherhood in a movie than this one. Eva’s face of happiness is wiped away almost permanently with her new role in life, and while her husband is thrilled at being a father, she just looks on despondently as if her life just ended. Without words, you immediately get the impression that she has no interest in being a mother, and she never truly forms an affectionate bond with her son Kevin. Soon, Eva sees the parts of herself she doesn’t like in Kevin’s cold, dark eyes as he glares right at her from year to year.
Swinton has never been an actress content to fall victim to overly emotive acting or to chewing up the scenery for an “Oscar moment.” She inhabits her characters more than she acts them, and her performance as Eva ranks among the very best of her career. She creates such an unforgettably human portrait of a mother whose superficial behavior towards her son isn’t fooling anyone, especially him. But at the same time, Swinton makes you feel deeply for her as she forces you to confront what you would do if you were in her situation. While it’s easy to blame her for everything that’s happened, there’s more to the story than we first see.
While we see Eva losing her temper around Kevin when he does bad things, we also come to realize that she’s the only person who realizes something is seriously wrong with him. Franklin on the other hand is either completely oblivious to or just doesn’t want to see how bad he has been. To everyone else Kevin is just a boy doing boyish things, and this leaves Eva in a more isolated state as she feels helpless from keeping her son from doing something even more destructive.
Kevin is played by three actors at different parts of his life: Rocky Duer, Jasper Newell, and Ezra Miller. All do great work in making Kevin the kind of child none of us ever hope to have; willfully disobedient, cruel to people, and emotionally detached from the world around them. Each perfects that wicked glare Kevin gives off to where you’d think they were auditioning for a Stanley Kubrick movie, hoping to outdo the unforgettable glare Vincent D’Onofrio perfected in “Full Metal Jacket.” They all show full commitment to the character they play and are brave in portraying such a seemingly evil seed.
But of those three actors, the one who deserves the most praise is Miller who you may remember from “City Island” or the Showtime original series “Californication.” He makes Kevin one of the scariest sociopaths I have seen in a movie for the longest time. Damien from “The Omen” (the original, not the remake) has got nothing on this guy, and it’s tempting to think he could give Alex from “A Clockwork Orange” a run for his money. Miller never portrays Kevin as a simple one-dimensional villain, but as one whose meaning in life has been corrupted to where he doesn’t see much good in anything.
Director Ramsay previously made “Ratcatcher” and “Morvern Callar,” and her work behind the camera has been justly acclaimed. With “We Need To Talk About Kevin,” she shares in Swinton’s fearlessness in delving into subject matter that’s as dark as any can get. Not once does she judge the characters here, and she leaves their actions up for us to judge. She is not out to provide answers to a situation like this because none are ever easy to come by, and no one other than Kevin can be easily condemned.
The movie’s opening shot has Eva participating with dozens of others in some Italian tomato festival to where it looks like they are all bathing in blood, and it symbolizes what will eventually become of her life. Ramsay makes great use of the color red throughout as it acts as a stain on Eva’s conscience, and everyone in town stares at her as if she is covered with it like Sissy Spacek was in “Carrie.” The movie is beautifully shot to where the sterile setting Eva and her family lives in is just asking to be forever dirtied, and the film score by Jonny Greenwood (who composed the score for “There Will Be Blood”) illustrates the violence just underneath the surface which will eventually explode for all to see.
“We Need To Talk About Kevin” could easily have been an exploitive feature, but it doesn’t ever come close to becoming one. There’s actually very little violence shown here as Ramsay is far more interested in the aftermath of what has happened, and the movie ends on a surprising note of possible redemption for some of the main characters. Granted, this is not a movie for everyone, but its utter bleakness is a necessary one and even as it comes to stand above it before the end credits.
Having seen it, I can now safely say that Tilda Swinton was most definitely robbed of an Oscar nomination for Best Actress here. What she does here is truly astounding as well as completely brave. Not many actors (especially those with children of their own) would easily venture into a topic that hits too close to home, but Swinton is not one to back off from a challenge.
Coming out of this bruising film experience, I kept thinking about this line said by Augustus Hill from the HBO series “OZ:”
“One of the last things Jesus did on Earth was to invite a prisoner to join him in heaven. He loved that criminal. I say he loved that criminal as much as he loved anyone. Jesus knew in his heart it takes a lot to love a sinner. But the sinner, he needs it all the more…”
* * * * out of * * * *
Other articles by Ben Kenber:
Great Actresses Snubbed by the Oscars in 2012
“I’ve Loved You so Long” – Kristin Scott Thomas in a Tour De Force Performance
“Michael Clayton”