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Revolutionary Road

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Revolutionary Road

Buzz says:   MPAA Rating: R
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Forget those Titanic lovebirds, Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio are reunited and really acting this time in director Sam Mendes’ grim and edgy look at ‘50s suburbia, Revolutionary Road . As April and Frank Wheeler they are seemingly the picture of classic suburban success: nice white house, two children, and Frank’s got a great career, but something is eating them alive. They are nearly the Connecticut equivalents of Edward Albee’s George and Martha in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

While Mendes, his screenwriter Justin Haythe and the original novel by Richard Yates don’t necessarily break any new ground in telling their tale of suburban angst, the film’s actors and the way the narrative is visually realized makes for a truly compelling film. Revolutionary Road explores the many trappings of success, the dashed aspirations for true happiness, and ultimately the questions one has about the truth of their existence.

Like Mendes’s Oscar winning American Beauty, Revolutionary Road expands on the veneer of suburban normalcy. Frank travels to a boring job to New York on commuter trains in his grey suit, hat and tie each day working for the Knox Corporation hoping for greater opportunities; April, the dutiful housewife, tends to the house and kids—but the love in their relationship is gone. In one last effort to recapture a spark of life, April suggests they quit their suburban lifestyle, move to Paris and rediscover themselves in a place they love. But circumstances and the reality of the situation seems to make that wish just a pipedream.

No one in their suburban circle seems to understand their emotional void, except John, the adult son of their realtor friend, Helen Givings (Kathy Bates). John has undergone 37 shock treatments and is clinically a basket case, but he clearly understands the Wheeler’s emotional emptiness. As John, Michael Shannon captures an effective balance of cynical wisdom and satire in this wonderful performance, which has been nominated for an Oscar as best supporting actor.

And reminiscent of the marvelous visual style of Mendes’ Road to Perdition, cinematographer Roger Deakins captures many of these clean antiseptic, but hollow settings of suburban life with such brightly lit images you painfully sense the lack of happiness in the characters shown. But Winslet and DeCaprio are the core of this story and both deliver compellingly haunting performances as Revolutionary Road leaves the viewer with a real sense of their pain and inability to express happiness.