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Always Young

"I was wrong to grow older. Pity. I was so happy as a child." - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

When she first fell in love the differences in their ages worried her.

Gus loved her now, but what if it was only affection, a big brother to a little sister, not the kind of love between a man and a woman? What if she grew up and he no longer cared?

He was on his own, a grown man making a living, and she was still a little girl living at home and barely out of pinafores.

She'd never kissed anyone before he kissed her, a quick brush on the cheek, but a kiss none the less. For all his talk no doubt he'd kissed a hundred girls and broken hearts all over.

She worried that when she was grown he would be too old for her, that the gap would be more pronounced as if it could widen over time, pulling them apart.

She counted years, months, and days. When he was this she would be that.

It wasn't as large a gap as some very happy marriages, she reminded herself..why, a cousin on her father's side had married a man fifteen years her elder...but she couldn't help counting the years between them.

Perhaps he would grow tired of her, think her a child, and find a grown woman. Perhaps she'd be repulsed if his hair turned gray before her's.

She was still a child in so many ways, still innocent, a girl who'd never been more than a hundred miles in any direction from home while he had seen the world.

The day he left she wanted to scream, to throw a tantrum, and beg him to stay. She wanted them to be schoolchildren again, when he'd carry her books, or play his fiddle as the children danced in the schoolyard. There was so little gap in their ages then.

She even wished once, a quiet, secret wish, that she could be the elder, could be fully grown and not a child. It would be easier if they were the same age, or if she was older.

It was the week after the news came that he'd been lost at sea and she was sitting on the cliffs overlooking the deceptively still water, the water that had dragged him down and stolen his breath, the water that had taken him from her in a single moment, when it came to her.

She'd run through the emotions - disbelief, anger, blinding sorrow - and now was left empty and hollow. There were no tears to shed, no more tormenting nightmares of reaching to him as he slipped beneath the waves.

It was only in that moment that it occurred to her that Gus would forever be as she last saw him...young, strong, never aging, never growing old. She would go on and he would remain.

It was cruel somehow that she would get older and older as the years passed, while he would never age a single day.

And eventually, she would be older than him.

Rated: 14 Accompaniment (Substance Abuse, Language May Offend)
Runs: 123 minutes
Director: Emilio Estevez
Country: US/Spain
Released: 2011
Starring: Martin Sheen, Emilio Estevez, Deborah Kara Unger, James Nesbitt

“After the sudden death of his globe-trekking son Daniel, Tom (Martin Sheen) flies to the Pyrenees to collect his body. But he spontaneously decides to complete Daniel’s journey, scattering his son’s ashes along El Camino de Santiago, which becomes a life-changing experience. Director Estevez took inspiration from Jack Hitt’s collection of stories, Off The Road, and contrived the perfect, personalised excuse for father and son to make the journey together. And what good travelling companions they prove. Sheen’s Tom is a widower and affluent Californian opthamologist who is on the golf course when he gets the call that his son has died in a freak storm while hiking in southern France. Tom is bewildered as well as bereft. The two had parted unpleasantly, Tom insistent on choosing a conventional life and getting on with it while Daniel opted to wander the world, arguing, ‘You don’t choose a life, you live it.’ On a rare impulse, Tom decides to honour Daniel’s philosophy by embarking on the El Camino de Santiago himself. The physical demands of walking 800 km and the unwanted company of fellow travellers are initially things Tom endures in his impatience to reach journey’s end. But along the way, nudged by visions of Daniel savouring a small incident, a gorgeous landscape, a moment, Tom finds himself looking inwards and letting himself experience the journey itself. En route he attracts a band of inescapable companions, each with a tale to tell, including an exuberant, wining and dining, dope-smoking Dutchman, a bitter Canadian and a talkative Irish author with writer’s block. Camaraderie, revelations and misadventures come with the blisters. Bedecked with an eclectic score, humour and tears, it’s a mood piece as much as it’s about characters... Sheen’s subtle performance – surly, uptight, cautiously poignant – builds in emotional impact, prompting one’s own reflections on the journey of life.” - Angie Errio, Empire

Rated: 14 Accompaniment (Substance Abuse, Language May Offend)
Runs: 123 minutes
Director: Emilio Estevez
Country: US/Spain
Released: 2011
Starring: Martin Sheen, Emilio Estevez, Deborah Kara Unger, James Nesbitt

“After the sudden death of his globe-trekking son Daniel, Tom (Martin Sheen) flies to the Pyrenees to collect his body. But he spontaneously decides to complete Daniel’s journey, scattering his son’s ashes along El Camino de Santiago, which becomes a life-changing experience. Director Estevez took inspiration from Jack Hitt’s collection of stories, Off The Road, and contrived the perfect, personalised excuse for father and son to make the journey together. And what good travelling companions they prove. Sheen’s Tom is a widower and affluent Californian opthamologist who is on the golf course when he gets the call that his son has died in a freak storm while hiking in southern France. Tom is bewildered as well as bereft. The two had parted unpleasantly, Tom insistent on choosing a conventional life and getting on with it while Daniel opted to wander the world, arguing, ‘You don’t choose a life, you live it.’ On a rare impulse, Tom decides to honour Daniel’s philosophy by embarking on the El Camino de Santiago himself. The physical demands of walking 800 km and the unwanted company of fellow travellers are initially things Tom endures in his impatience to reach journey’s end. But along the way, nudged by visions of Daniel savouring a small incident, a gorgeous landscape, a moment, Tom finds himself looking inwards and letting himself experience the journey itself. En route he attracts a band of inescapable companions, each with a tale to tell, including an exuberant, wining and dining, dope-smoking Dutchman, a bitter Canadian and a talkative Irish author with writer’s block. Camaraderie, revelations and misadventures come with the blisters. Bedecked with an eclectic score, humour and tears, it’s a mood piece as much as it’s about characters... Sheen’s subtle performance – surly, uptight, cautiously poignant – builds in emotional impact, prompting one’s own reflections on the journey of life.” - Angie Errio, Empire

Rated: 14 Accompaniment (Substance Abuse, Language May Offend)
Runs: 123 minutes
Director: Emilio Estevez
Country: US/Spain
Released: 2011
Starring: Martin Sheen, Emilio Estevez, Deborah Kara Unger, James Nesbitt

“After the sudden death of his globe-trekking son Daniel, Tom (Martin Sheen) flies to the Pyrenees to collect his body. But he spontaneously decides to complete Daniel’s journey, scattering his son’s ashes along El Camino de Santiago, which becomes a life-changing experience. Director Estevez took inspiration from Jack Hitt’s collection of stories, Off The Road, and contrived the perfect, personalised excuse for father and son to make the journey together. And what good travelling companions they prove. Sheen’s Tom is a widower and affluent Californian opthamologist who is on the golf course when he gets the call that his son has died in a freak storm while hiking in southern France. Tom is bewildered as well as bereft. The two had parted unpleasantly, Tom insistent on choosing a conventional life and getting on with it while Daniel opted to wander the world, arguing, ‘You don’t choose a life, you live it.’ On a rare impulse, Tom decides to honour Daniel’s philosophy by embarking on the El Camino de Santiago himself. The physical demands of walking 800 km and the unwanted company of fellow travellers are initially things Tom endures in his impatience to reach journey’s end. But along the way, nudged by visions of Daniel savouring a small incident, a gorgeous landscape, a moment, Tom finds himself looking inwards and letting himself experience the journey itself. En route he attracts a band of inescapable companions, each with a tale to tell, including an exuberant, wining and dining, dope-smoking Dutchman, a bitter Canadian and a talkative Irish author with writer’s block. Camaraderie, revelations and misadventures come with the blisters. Bedecked with an eclectic score, humour and tears, it’s a mood piece as much as it’s about characters... Sheen’s subtle performance – surly, uptight, cautiously poignant – builds in emotional impact, prompting one’s own reflections on the journey of life.” - Angie Errio, Empire

Rated: Parental Guidance (Language May Offend, Mature Theme)
Runs: 99 minutes
Director: Simon Curtis
Country: UK/US
Released: 2011
Starring: Michelle Williams, Eddie Redmayne, Kenneth Branagh, Julia Ormond, Judi Dench
Awards: Golden Globe Winner and Academy Award nominee for Best Actress, Academy Award nominee for Best Supporting Actor.

“In 1956, the press was agog that screen siren Marilyn Monroe had sensationally been paired with theatre giant Laurence Olivier in the British movie The Prince and the Showgirl, but the drama that unfolded backstage offers greater intrigue. Their clash of styles is revealed in this beguiling adaptation of a memoir by Colin Clark (played by a wide-eyed Eddie Redmayne), who was a production runner on the film and became a confidante/companion to the isolated movie star during her stay in England. Michelle Williams captivates as Marilyn, matching her childlike lust for life with a darker, destructive nature... A lively supporting cast adds to the buoyant mood. But the standouts are a hilarious Kenneth Branagh, whose Olivier is always ready with a scathing one-liner, and Judi Dench, who plays Dame Sybil Thorndike like a fussing aunt. It oozes with romance, too, but most of all it's delightfully evocative of a bygone era of film-making.” - Stella Papamichael

Rated: Parental Guidance
Runs: 95 minutes
Director: Philippe Falardeau
Country: Canada
Released: 2011
Starring: Fellag, Sophie Nelisse, Emilien Neron, Danielle Proulx
Language: In French with English subtitles.
Awards: Multiple Festival award winner, including Best Canadian Feature, Toronto International Film Festival; Toronto Film Critics Association’s Rogers Best Canadian Film Award; Academy Award nominee for Best Foreign Film.
Digital projection.

“Director Falardeau brings a luminous warmth to this affecting story of an Algerian emigre who finds work as a teacher in a Montreal elementary school. Bachir Lazhar, who is applying for refugee status, inherits his job from a beloved teacher who has hanged herself in her classroom. Despite that melodramatic premise, the drama is supremely sensitive and understated, as Lazhar - recovering from his own family tragedy - tries to adapt to the liberal classroom culture in Quebec.” - Brian D. Johnson, MacLeans Magazine “Falardeau captures the pulse of primary school classroom politics in this tender and touching drama.... A smart screenplay, moving performances - particularly by the child cast - and social observations free of any political agenda make this film a high achiever.” - Radheyan Simonpillai, Now Magazine. “A deserved candidate for Best Foreign Language Film consideration.” - Peter Howell, Toronto.com