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REVIEW: BOYHOOD

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MV_Boyhood

Let this be the one and only time the Dig will ever commend the use of a Coldplay song. The normally irritatingly sloppy, bendy strums of “Yellow” that kick off Richard Linklater’s ambitious Boyhood will catch you off guard. It’s far from the most predictable song to include in a 2014 release, one that makes you aware of exactly what song is playing instead of placating you so you don’t get bored by the time the credit for executive producer rolls around.

This is because the music in Boyhood is more than a mixtape to distract the audience from the boring parts of a movie, as it is in most cases. Filmed over the course of 12 years with the same actors, Boyhood follows the life of Mason (Ellar Coltrane) from age eight to his freshman year of college. The music along the way serves as a reminder that Mason is not a character stuck in time, and helps us track his progression while perhaps remembering where we were when “Crazy” by Gnarls Barkley, “Do You Realize??” by the Flaming Lips, or “Good Girls Go Bad” by Cobra Starship were on the radio. The songs ground you on the journey without removing you from the overall experience, like writing the date and time on your hand before taking your preferred psychedelic.

While the extended production may read like a gimmick, the film is not. It is in many ways the spiritual successor to Linklater’s excellent Before series, in that both are naturalistic essays that trace the evolution of the love, philosophy, and attitudes of its characters over an extended period of time. The advantage that Boyhood has over the Before films is that the gaps in the story don’t need to be filled in or explained. Watching Mason grow up in real time, we see the moment a certain behavior began or idea took root without heavy-handed foreshadowing. The passage of time is a tricky concept to capture on film, but Boyhood nails it: Nothing in the world is permanent, but everything that happens—no matter how small—has repercussions, even if you’re not aware of it at the time.

Clocking in at 160 minutes, Boyhood feels its length in a good way, like binging on an excellent TV show. Watching this little boy becoming a man will make you sympathize with cheek-pinching aunts who can’t believe how big you are. If you’re a parent or plan on being one, you will probably cry during Boyhood, but not because anything is particularly sad or tragic. You’ll cry because you’re proud of Mason, even if you had no direct role in his life.

BOYHOOD | RATED R | OPENS FRIDAY 7.18 AT KENDALL SQUARE CINEMA + AMC BOSTON COMMON, OPENS FRIDAY 7.25 AT THE COOLIDGE


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