Wildlife (2018)
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Wildlife Movie Review
Wildlife is a 2018 indie drama film directed by Paul Dano and starring Carey Mulligan and Jake Gyllenhaal. It’s a very well acted and emotional, but flawed drama.
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“Well, ain’t this a wild life, son?“
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I personally found the story very strong. The film follows a woman during the sixties who struggles with her son after her husband leaves to work in fighting forest fires. Eventually, she cheats on him and their marriage unfortunately ends. I liked the overall story quite a bit, but still some plot points I found annoying, including the overly soapy third act with some unnecessary scenes here and there. The beginning is also quite slow.
The film portrays the sixties very well and with a solid amount of detail. The emotional investment is strong and the entire relationship between a mother and her son is so well done. I really liked those confrontation scenes and the film showcases how terrible it is for children when their parents are divorcing while also portraying the plight of single women during this period.
Carey Mulligan has always been a terrific actress and this is definitely one of her greatest performances because the role is very demanding and she commands the screen in her every scene. I still found her not fitting for this role as she looks too young for it. But still she gave a very emotive, wonderful performance. But Jake Gyllenhaal is reliably terrific per usual, though I wanted a longer screen time for him. And Ed Oxenbould is so good himself and such a promising young talent. He played a dull, but realistic kid.
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Wildlife has fine cinematography as it looks very good throughout. The score is also good and the direction from Paul Dano is surprisingly terrific for a first-time director. Actually, he did a much better job than Jonah Hill did in ‘Mid90s’, but both movies still are solid, but flawed. Yes, Wildlife is impressively realistic, but also slowly paced at times and containing some unnecessary or sappy scenes. The dialogue is great, but I wanted more strong discussions and conversations.
Wildlife has its weaker scenes which are either slow, unnecessary or soapy. But it’s still a pretty solid, mostly very realistic period drama with some emotional moments, strong dialogue and good performances from Ed Oxenbould and Jake Gyllenhaal. Carey Mulligan herself steals the show and commands the screen owing to one terrific performance whereas Paul Dano directed the film quite well. I just wish the first and third act were as strong as the second one was.
