MusicChat
It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.
Mandeep Tyson
The acting in this movie is really good.
Geraldine
The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.
Cristal
The movie really just wants to entertain people.
MartinHafer
"My Life So Far" is a memoir where a man looks back at his life in Scotland when he was a child. In some ways, it's quite reminiscent of Marcel Pagnol's wonderful films about his childhood ("My Father's Glory" and "My Mother's Castle"), though Pagnol's life is much more satisfying to watch (or read about)--mostly because the mood is so much more consistent. With "My Life So Far", it begins with humor and for a while you assume the film is a comedy. You really like the family and the way the child views life. Later, however, the film turns much darker and the characters, who you liked, act rather vile. Because of this, it feels a bit unsatisfying because the abrupt changes in mood really took me out of the story. I know life IS sometimes this way, but I really wish the film had made up its mind and chosen a single course. Not a bad time passer but not a film I heartily recommend either.
porter-18
With an accomplished cast and some good reviews, I expected much more from this movie. Hoping for something along the lines of the great "My Life as a Dog", instead I found a stilted disjointed movie with no real soul. Malcolm McDowell was very good, but most other characters were two-dimensional, and the father, who apparently was a madcap inventor, comes across as a humorless corporate manager.
TxMike
"My Life So Far" is based on a true account of life in a Scottish family between WWI and WWII. It was filmed around Argyll, Scotland, and is certainly a beautiful movie to watch.The story is told from a 10-year-old boy's point of view. His rather large family (8 or 10 children) live on the estate of his mother's mother. His dad is a bright man but is a somewhat impractical inventor. The single, rich uncle is threatening to evict them all when the matriarch dies.The story unfolds nicely, the father comes to grips with some of his faults, relationships are examined. Music is well-integrated throughout the movie. It ends in a very satisfactory manner.This basically "slice of life" movie holds your interest and is overall very entertaining. Not an earth-shaker, I give it a strong "7" of "10", meaning for me that it is better than 70% of the movies out there.
cathy-39
I think I would never have been to see this movie if it hadn't been for Colin Firth. I don't love family dramas, mostly because it's always based on the parents point of view, even if the central hero is a child. As I am always on the side of the child, it seemed to me, while I was watching the movie, that I was the only one who truly see how much this child was abused.In "My life so far", the young Fraser is caught between an irresponsible father who beats him and a mother who doesn't protect him. And even if the camera shows us his suffering and his fear, it always pushes us to to forgive and forget what has just happened. Mostly because at the same time we are expected to be bewitched by his father's desire for a French cellist. Of course he is gorgeous, and the desire we see in his eyes is breathtaking, but clearly the script wants us to love and forgive this child-like father at any cost, even at the cost of his own son. The last scene is pretty clear on that subject: the film doesn't end on Fraser but on his father, who is now so"good" to let him drink, smoke and watch pornographic photos. What is the moral of this? The father stays irresponsible and his last smile wants us to believe that he is changed and that he is a good father.As I love Colin Firth's acting so much, I must say I am very puzzled by this movie. He plays very well indeed, that is not the problem, he has all the subtleties the character demands, but the film just doesn't amount to anything. No one really seems to care enough for Fraser and it seems that it is the only reason why the father takes up so much place in the movie. This idealized father that even Fraser calls a genius. But how could he ever say the contrary since nobody ever tells him that what he feels when he suffers is true?
