I've been wanting to see 'An Education' for a long time but was never in a city where it was showing... then I saw you had posted about it, and since I didn't want to be spoiled I managed to watch it first... and I'm glad I did! lol I actually really loved the film, I didn't think it was (or was meant to be) a universal statement of how women 'come of age' (although I've seen so many films of young men coming of age in love with an older woman). I thought it showed some very different women (her Mother, her teacher, and her Head Mistress, in a very nice performance by Emma Thompson) who were all vaguely dissatisfied with their lives but who were doing their best to make their lives productive and fulfilling.... It certainly didn't show marriage as the ideal answer for any woman, certainly her Mother, or her lover's wife were not women totally happy in their marriages. It really wasn't romanticizing anything IMO: the girl romanticized everything herself, thinking she had found the answers that everyone else had missed, only to discover that she was wrong. I'm glad you focused on the line: "I've learned there are no shortcuts." because I do think that that line is key, young people often think they have found the short cut, and heaven knows we all wish for the short cut (the pill that will make a thin, the lottery which will make us rich, whatever).
I actually liked the friend (I don't know the characters or actor's name), who was much more honest about being a thief, and recognizing that the girl was just fooling herself.... That she over-looked the robbery, so why was she surprised about the adultery? I really liked a lot of things about this film.
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I actually really loved the film, I didn't think it was (or was meant to be) a universal statement of how women 'come of age' (although I've seen so many films of young men coming of age in love with an older woman). I thought it showed some very different women (her Mother, her teacher, and her Head Mistress, in a very nice performance by Emma Thompson) who were all vaguely dissatisfied with their lives but who were doing their best to make their lives productive and fulfilling.... It certainly didn't show marriage as the ideal answer for any woman, certainly her Mother, or her lover's wife were not women totally happy in their marriages. It really wasn't romanticizing anything IMO: the girl romanticized everything herself, thinking she had found the answers that everyone else had missed, only to discover that she was wrong. I'm glad you focused on the line:
"I've learned there are no shortcuts."
because I do think that that line is key, young people often think they have found the short cut, and heaven knows we all wish for the short cut (the pill that will make a thin, the lottery which will make us rich, whatever).
I actually liked the friend (I don't know the characters or actor's name), who was much more honest about being a thief, and recognizing that the girl was just fooling herself.... That she over-looked the robbery, so why was she surprised about the adultery? I really liked a lot of things about this film.