A cut above

Wildlife is an adaptation of the 1990 novel by Richard Ford about a family coming apart at the seams, and while cinema is full of families coming apart at the seams this one is a cut above. It is exquisite and riveting. It pays proper attention to its characters. And it is brilliantly acted. According to recent figures, the chances of Carey Mulligan ever turning in a duff performance are 0.0 per cent but she still wholly outdoes herself here.

This is the directorial debut of actor Paul Dano, who worked on the script with his partner, Zoe Kazan, for several years. He initially chanced upon the novel in a bookshop and was understandably hooked by the opening line: ‘In the fall of 1960, when I was sixteen and my father was for a time not working, my mother met a man named Warren Miller and fell in love with him.’ The mother is Jeanette (Mulligan). The father is Jerry (Jake Gyllenhaal). The narrator is their son, Joe (Ed Oxenbould), whose age has been changed to 14 here, for some reason. A lesser film adaptation would have included Joe speaking in voice-over, which is always the easy option, but there is no voice-over. Instead, we watch the disintegration of his parents’ marriage solely through his eyes. He’s not a boy who says much but he doesn’t have to say much. We see what he sees, sometimes in full, or sometimes framed by a doorway or window. His distress and disorientation never have to be stated out loud.

It’s set in small-town Montana, where the family are trying to settle. We understand that Jerry has never held onto a job for long so they’ve moved around a lot. He works as an instructor at the golf club and everyone is optimistic but then he is fired.