Adapted by writer Nick Hornby from Lynn Barber’s life chronicle, “An Education” is already garnering award buzz for Carey Mulligan’s lead performance as Jenny, a teen coming of age in early-’60s London.
But the movie scenes surrounding her are exasperatingly messed up. Director Lone Scherfig is uncertain whether to treat Jenny’s account as a positive piece, a feminist advisory tale or a creepy arrangement of David, played by Peter Sarsgaard, the debonair older beau who’s clearly is not what he seems to be. Mulligan’s charm only goes so far bit the plot has some interesting points to ponder about.
Every scene flashes with sprightly conversation, as Jenny steers her way in the real world of thrilling, if deceitful, adults. The film will ring a bell to viewers that in early 1960’s England, the place was still stuck in postwar soberness.
Scherfig, Hornby, lenser John de Borman, production designer Andrew McAlpine, composer Paul Englishby, music supervisor Kle Savidge, costume designer Odile Dicks-Mireaux and all the production crew attentively focus on the details of period appearances, echoes and manners.
The film’s key character is Jenny’s English teacher Miss Stubbs, played by Olivia Williams, a striking woman underneath her proper, nerdy glasses, attire and strict attitude. Stubbs distinguishes the changes in her star pupil and their ultimate confrontation is bracingly depicted.
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