Fatherhood and tired moms are a major thread throughout one of the most innovative films of all time: Boyhood.
Writer/director Richard Linklater had an idea for a screenplay in 2001 about a boy growing up in Texas. But rather than use prosthetics to age the characters, he decided to shoot them for a week every year for 12 years.
This could have been simply a gimmick, but this was Richard Linklater, the king of independent film. (Independent = no money. No money = no CGI, no exotic locales, no hefty actor salaries. Dialogue is everything.) So he cast a six-year-old named Ellar Coltrane, who had never acted before, and had faith the kid would able to carry the movie and maintain his skills when he was 18. (He got lucky – Ellar can act and has poise.) Linklater then cast his own daughter (who also had never acted) as Ellar’s sister, and his friends Patricia Arquette and Ethan Hawke as their mom and dad, because he could rely on them, and they wound up collaborating on the writing as much as they could.
As daunting as this project seems, in some ways Linklater did himself a service. He didn’t have to use makeup to age actors (or cast an older actor to play teenage Eller.) He didn’t have to worry about using period-appropriate hairstyles, wardrobe, cars or props. We used flip-phones in 2001, and smart-phones in 2013. Pop culture has shifted from Britney Spears to Lady Gaga. Roger Clemens is seen in actual footage, pitching at the top of his game in 2005. Nowadays, he’s a steroid-using pariah who hasn’t played in seven years.
It’s fascinating. The film that opened four days ago began shooting before 9/11 happened. And four years before YouTube was launched, and six before the first iPhone. When production began, just about all movies were shot on 35mm; that film stock isn’t even produced anymore.
Linklater managed to keep the story linear and the footage seamless. You only know a year has passed because Ellar has subtly aged or his changed his haircut. I won’t spoil the story, but I will tell you it’s so real and you’ll feel so engaged that even though it’s two hours and 46 minutes long, you’ll want it to continue. It received a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and it’ll get multiple Oscar nominations. You gotta see it.
