While not quite deserving of the almost universal critical acclaim it has received, I found "Boyhood" to be an intriguing film that mostly kept my attention, not a small feat considering both its long runtime and lack of a traditional plot.
The film is built on a gimmick, and mostly it works. It was written and shot over a twelve year period, and the actors grow and change along with their characters. I'm inclined to deduct a few points for the film's dependence on this gimmick. The story it tells would not be enough to carry an identical movie in which different actors were cast as the characters grew up. The novelty factor is a large part of the appeal. Richard Linklater's "Before" trilogy, also starring Ethan Hawke, plays with the passage of time, too--each film in the series was filmed nine years after its predecessor. While watching how the characters in those movies have aged between installments is part of the fun, the three films also manage to stand on their own as brilliantly written and acted, thought provoking films. The "passage of time" gimmick isn't really a gimmick in this case, since the films don't rely on it as completely as "Boyhood" does. While in the "Before" movies I found myself emotionally invested, in "Boyhood" I felt more like a dispassionate observer.
That being said, the gimmick does work for most of the film. The goal here was to tell, not a slice of life story, but a slices of life story made up of brief vignettes portrayed in chronological order. While there are recurring plotlines and themes, there is no central narrative aside from the very basic: a boy grows up. This would seem like a difficult idea to keep interesting for 160 minutes, but the film manages it for almost that long. It rarely follows one particular "age" for more than fifteen minutes, constantly moving forward and giving the film a brisk pace. Even if it didn't manage to get me emotionally invested, it did hook me on an intellectual level--I was often curious what was going to happen next. For the most part it's refreshingly devoid of clichéd moments (some parts featuring abusive stepparents are about as close as it comes). At one point the characters go out target shooting. In most films something bad is going to happen when guns come out. Here that wasn't the case. The scene merely documented a normal moment in the lives of the characters. I also appreciated how the film trusted its audience enough not to completely spell out everything. It didn't feel the need to overtly explain every little thing that happened in between sequences, instead letting the audience work things out for themselves.
By the last twenty minutes or so, I did start to feel that the film had run a little long. There were three or four spots where I felt it could easily have ended before it did. But it's impressive that they managed to keep the plates spinning in the air for as long as they did. It's certainly a film worth checking out, but more for its originality than anything else.
B
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