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We Need to Talk About Kevin

16 replies

JosieRosie · 28/10/2011 10:19

Saw this last night and loved it. I'm a huge fan of the book, it's one of my favourites, but because of the way it's written, I would have thought it was unfilmable. Well the structure of the film is very different to the book, but they have done a cracking job. Tilda Swinton and Ezra Miller are just fabulous. A lot of little details - Kevin's pyjamas, the shirt he wears out to dinner with Eva - are exactly as described in the book.
I can't recommend it highly enough but be warned - I found it just as disturbing as many horror films I've seen. If you haven't read the book, I would imagine it would be even more upsetting. My friend was in tears at the end. Having said all that, go see it! Smile It's a fabulous film.
Anyone else seen it?

OP posts:
Dancergirl · 30/10/2011 18:58

Dh and I saw it last night - what a fabulous film!

Yes it's very disturbing but the whole way it was put together was a piece of first class film-making imo. My heart was literally pounding for the last hour or so in anticipation.

noddyholder · 04/11/2011 12:10

Saw it last night really enjoyed it but the little boy was disturbing esp aged about 8. Tilda swinton was brilliant seamless performance My dp was really disturbed by it and could see why it caused a few rows in my book group!

boglach · 04/11/2011 13:24

I thought it was amazing. Ezra Miller and Tilda Swinton were mesmerizing

ImperialBlether · 06/11/2011 11:09

I thought it was amazing, too.

The only thing is that the book is so detailed, you really do wonder whether it was nature or nurture that made Kevin the way he was - the film was too short to really do that, I think. For example with poor Celia's eye, I think if you hadn't read the book it would be hard to know what had gone on there.

I read a really good review in the Guardian which said that Tilda Swinton looked blind in the current scenes, as though all she could see were memories.

It reminds me a little of the unreliable narration in Notes on a Scandal, where you're reading the book and the teenage boy is described as dirty and ugly and a bit simple, where of course he isn't at all. I can't remember too clearly, but isn't Kevin described as unattractive in the book, because we're only seeing his mum's point of view? Oh god he was anything but unattractive!

The only flaw, in my opinion, is in the scene where Tilda holds hands with the other prisoner's mum - a kind of 'we know how marginalised and sad we are' scene. But in the book, once the other prisoner's mum realises who she is, she shuns her, so that there is no solace to be found with anyone at all. That was a very harsh reminder in the book that nobody at all identifies with her, sympathises with her or understands her.

ShowOfHands · 06/11/2011 11:11

I couldn't stand the book but I do have high hopes for the film. I'm really looking forward to seeing it.

ImperialBlether · 06/11/2011 11:30

Lionel Shriver really is an awful writer, but I think she has good ideas. I read one of her books called Double Fault - never in my life have I read anything so boring.

LeBOF · 06/11/2011 11:35

The one about snooker is pretty crap too, but I'm very much looking forward to this film.

boglach · 06/11/2011 15:16

Although I found Ezra Miller's Kevin repulsive and creepy, he was also very captivating and I wanted to see him more on the screen. I just found myself searching his face, like his broken and bewildered mother, for signs of normal humanity

But then that is the thing with psychopaths, they just don't think or feel like the rest of us. And there is a suggestion that they are indeed born. If I would hold any parent culpable, it would be his father though. He never saw his son from the start, just an all american cardboard cut out of what he wanted him to be. That is more damaging. And actually I think Eva did know her son and even she admitted in the end that she loved him.

ihatecbeebies · 10/11/2011 00:01

Is the film out in the UK or just the US? I read the book and loved it and am looking forward to the film

betterwhenthesunshines · 11/11/2011 08:24

I read the book long enough ago to have forgotten some of the details but I think the film did an absolutely wonderful interpretation. Some of the scenes at the start were a little heavy handed and I thought there was rather too much analagous red paint scrubbing off her hands...

The film seemd to me to be a bit more black and white. The first part of the book you really do wonder whether he is that way or whether it's all her interpretation of a normal child's difficult behaviour. The film is a lot more specific.

Wonderful though, and highly recommended. I don't think I have ever sat so still, glued to my chair for such a long time!

Acinonyx · 11/11/2011 17:18

It's been a long time since I read the book - which I really loved (and I've liked another of her's - 'So much for all that' - I like her writing style very much).

I agree - the film is less subtle but that probably can't be helped when you make a film of a complicated doorstopper. I also found some of the slow artistic footage a bit wearing . Great overall though - and I thought it was tougher to watch as a film than to read even though I knew the ending.

I thought the book hinted at more of a reconciliation at the end too.

upahill · 19/11/2011 12:53

My mum and sister went to see it and where glad they did.
The film is on next Sunday but it clashes with the hockey game!!!! (don't know what to do now!!)

upahill · 21/05/2012 10:23

Finally got to see 'We need to talk' last night.

All I can say is that is was very predicitable.

I watched it with DS2 and could have told him what was going to happen next all the way through. No twists, turns or answers or even the last scene designed for you to interperate your own ending.
A let down!

Gabeesh · 23/05/2012 23:55

This book was my honeymoon reading, around the time I found I was expecting a son. Probably a mistake reading it tbh!

Dee03 · 24/05/2012 00:07

Ive never read the book but saw the film a few weeks ago..........i cant say whether i enjoyed it or not really....it was just odd but yet captivating.......i did kind of guess what was going to happen in the end.....uummm!!

Thegoddessblossom · 08/07/2012 20:45

I loved the book and was pleasantly surprised by the film.

Ezra miller captured the sheer malevolence of Kevin brilliantly.

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