We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011)

Kevin's mother struggles to love her strange child, despite the increasingly vicious things he says and does as he grows up. But Kevin is just getting started, and his final act will be beyond anything anyone imagined.

Director:

Lynne Ramsay

Writers:

Lynne Ramsay (screenplay), Rory Kinnear (screenplay),

Stars:

Tilda Swinton, John C. Reilly, Ezra Miller

Nominated for 1 Golden Globe. Another 17 wins & 30 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Tilda Swinton	...	Eva Khatchadourian
John C. Reilly	...	Franklin
Ezra Miller	...	Kevin, Teenager
Jasper Newell	...	Kevin, 6-8 Years
Rock Duer	...	Kevin, Toddler (as Rocky Duer)
Ashley Gerasimovich	...	Celia
Siobhan Fallon	...	Wanda (as Siobhan Fallon Hogan)
Alex Manette	...	Colin
Kenneth Franklin	...	Soweto
Leslie Lyles	...	Smash Lady
Paul Diomede	...	Corrections Officer Al
Michael Campbell	...	Corrections Officer
J. Mallory McCree	...	Prison Boy (as J. Mal McCree)
Mark Elliot Wilson	...	Eva's Lawyer
James Chen	...	Dr. Foulkes

Storyline

Eva Khatchadourian is trying to piece together her life following the "incident". Once a successful travel writer, she is forced to take whatever job comes her way, which of late is as a clerk in a travel agency. She lives a solitary life as people who know about her situation openly shun her, even to the point of violent actions toward her. She, in turn, fosters that solitary life because of the incident, the aftermath of which has turned her into a meek and scared woman. That incident involved her son Kevin Khatchadourian, who is now approaching his eighteenth birthday. Eva and Kevin have always had a troubled relationship, even when he was an infant. Whatever troubles he saw, Franklin, Eva's complacent husband, just attributed it to Kevin being a typical boy. The incident may be seen by both Kevin and Eva as his ultimate act in defiance against his mother.

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Plot Keywords:

travel agency | defiance | travel writer | boy | alienation | 

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Genres:

Drama | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for disturbing violence and behavior, some sexuality and language

Details

Official Sites:

Official site [jp] Official site [uk]

Country:

UK USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

21 October 2011 (UK)

Also Known As:

Tenemos que hablar de Kevin

Filming Locations:

Buñol, Valencia, Comunidad Valenciana, Spain

Box Office

Budget:

$7,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

$24,587 (USA) (9 December 2011)

Gross:

$1,738,692 (USA) (18 May 2012)

Company Credits

Production Co:

BBC Films, UK Film Council, Footprint Investment Fund

Technical Specs

Runtime:

112 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

This is the second movie where the assumed death of John C. Reilly's daughter's pet rodent is a key plot point. The other movie is Carnage.

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Goofs

During one of the close ups of the maps decorating Eva's wall, as the camera moves upward you can see its shadow on the wall.

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Quotes

Eva: You don't look happy.
Kevin: Have I ever?

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Crazy Credits

There are no opening credits.

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Connections

Referenced in Supernatural: We Need to Talk About Kevin (2012)

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Soundtracks

"Aquaculture"
Written by Jana Winderen
Performed by Jana Winderen
Published by Touch Music (MCPS)

User Reviews

Guilt trip

Lynne Ramsay's film is a tour de force of economy. There's not a single shot wasted. Not a moment goes by that isn't informing, telling the story, adding to the cumulative exploration of a dysfunctional mother- son relationship and its purgatorial fall-out. It's also a rather gentle film (dare I say it, a feminine film): the narrative is constantly split between past and present, the tone moving between all-pervasive paranoia, drudge and romance. The movement isn't jerky though, with regular pacing of the flashing back and forwards, meticulously edited cuts and a very clever original + co-opted soundtrack that often works in contrary motion to the tone, smoothing it out.

This is a film about a mother confronting motherhood across an overlapping three-act structure: before Kevin's birth, with Kevin, after Kevin's crime. Tilda Swinton is a shoo-in for an Oscar nomination for her assumption of the role, her selection of uncomprehending thousand yard stares far removed from the opaque look favoured by many other actors working to this level. It helps that the three Kevins who play the title role are all uniformly superb as well - hideous, sly, handsome.

It's the visuals that pulled me up and pressed me back down over and over. The opening 5 minutes or so are worth more than many hours of mediocre film making that I'm perfectly happy to sit through as a general rule in a cinema: the Boschian Tomatina fight, with the equivocal vision of a blissed out Eva buried in the blood red Sartrean- viscous filth is a particularly arresting opening statement (think of the bleaching-white flour of Morvern Callar). It's not an easy watch, although there is no sensationalism. It is, however, always poetry. 9/10