The Sense of an Ending **** (2017, Jim Broadbent, Charlotte Rampling, Harriet Walter, Billy Howle, Freya Mavor, Matthew Goode) – Movie Review

Jim Broadbent is outstanding in a big, fat, meaty star role he is ideal for, in a moving and haunting 2017 film adaptation of Julian Barnes’s 2011 Booker Prize-winning bestseller The Sense of an Ending.

Giving his best performance in years, Jim Broadbent is outstanding in a big, fat, meaty star role he is ideal for in a moving and haunting adaptation of Julian Barnes’s 2011 Booker Prize-winning bestseller The Sense of an Ending. If there is a sense that the ending is a bit too optimistic, almost a happy ending, well, why not? This would be a very gloomy movie otherwise. It is also, like the rest of film, a bit enigmatic, subtle and elusive, so that’s good.

Nick Payne manages the difficult job of adapting the novel for the screen, effortlessly shifting from past to present as the spotlight is put on the ever so slightly smug and grumpy ageing Clapham camera shop owner Tony Webster (Jim Broadbent), who is haunted by the consequences of his act of vicious bad behaviour in the long-ago past when he is presented with a mysterious legacy. Now, to move on, he has to confront the actual truth of his life story not the comfortable memory he has of it.

Director Ritesh Batra (2013’s The Lunchbox) handles it all very neatly and cleanly, no trouble at all, getting mood, atmosphere, pace and characters all just right. Despite a clutch of good performances from good actors, it is Broadbent’s film. But Charlotte Rampling as Veronica Ford, the woman Tony starts obsessing over and stalking in the present, and especially Harriet Walter, as his ex-wife and constant friend Margaret Webster, are just perfect too.

The past isn’t nearly as interesting, but Billy Howle as young Tony and Freya Mavor as young Veronica are striking and get the job done nicely. Just about everybody gets enough screen time to shine.

It is the second film of the week that Matthew Goode is in, and this time I’ll refrain from saying he gave a goode performance (which he does anyway, as Tony’s history teacher Mr Joe Hunt).

The cast are Jim Broadbent as Tony Webster, Billy Howle as Young Tony Webster, Charlotte Rampling as Veronica Ford, Freya Mavor as Young Veronica Ford, Joe Alwyn as Adrian Finn, Andrew Buckley as Adrian Jr, Peter Wight as Colin Simpson, Jack Loxton as Young Colin Simpson, Hilton McRae as Alex Stuart, Timothy Innes as Young Alex Stuart, Harriet Walter as Margaret, Emily Mortimer as Veronica’s mother Sarah Ford, Michelle Dockery as Tony’s daughter Susie Webster, Matthew Goode as Tony’s history teacher Mr Joe Hunt,  Edward Holcroft as Veronica’s brother Jack Ford, and James Wilby as Veronica’s father David Ford.

Shooting in London and Bristol for seven weeks started on 8 September 2015. It is made by Origin Pictures and BBC Films.

The Sense of an Ending premiered at the Palm Springs International Film Festival on 2 January 2017, and was released in the US on 10 March 2017 by CBS Films and Lionsgate and in the UK on 14 April 2017, by Studio Canal.

It runs 108 minutes.

Batra’s film Our Souls at Night was also released in 2017 on Netflix, followed by Photograph in 2019.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Movie Review

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