Little Children, the second film by actor-turned-director Todd Field, and adapted from the novel by Tom Perotta, has been treated extremely unfairly due to its limited release in America. It's been in theaters since early October, but only in January did it finally expand to about one hundred theaters. New Line Cinema has done a terrible job in distributing a brilliant, well received film, by releasing it with basically no promotion, and giving it an extremely minimal Oscar push. Yet it still receives three important nominations: Best Actress in a Leading Role for the always great Kate Winslet, Best Supporting Actor for Jackie Earle Haley (working for the first time in fourteen years), and Best Adapted Screenplay for Todd Field and Tom Perotta. Yet New Line still isn't expanding the theater count of the film and its doomed to an April DVD release devoid of any special features whatsoever.
Like critic A.O. Scott from The New York Times has said about the film, it is incredibly "hard to stop thinking about." Todd Field has crafted a delicate, edgy suburban drama with some remarkable performances. Every actor holds their own so well that even the great Jennifer Connelly is overshadowed by the rest of the supporting cast. Kate Winslet and Patrick Wilson play the adulterous lead characters particularly convincingly, yet the supporting cast are the standouts here. Jackie Earle Haley deserves all the awards attention he is getting and more for his role as Ronnie J. McGorvey, a convicted sex offender. Noah Emmerich is fantastic as Larry, an ex-cop who has good intentions but comes across as a bully, and Phyllis Somerville is equally brilliant as May, Ronnie's elderly mother. While Haley is getting well deserved awards and nominations, Emmerich and Somervile have not received much recognition for their standout performances
Field shows a lot of thought in his directing work, placing a large amount of symbolism throughout the film, a reason for repeat viewings. He paints the screen with a bright, intense visual style that gives the painful reality of the movie a satirical tone. Also aiding this tone is the use of a narrator, telling the story in a way that resembles a children's book. The narration takes a little time to get used to, but it only adds to the genius of Little Children. For instance, the narrator suddenly disappears when the character of Ronnie is introduced, allowing the audience to judge him themselves. The narrator reappears only as Ronnie's mother is introduced, when we know his character enough to judge him accurately. We come to realize that everyone in the story has considerable character flaws, yet Ronnie is the only individual who openly acknowledges them. Little Children is one of the best films of 2006, and deserves so much more attention than what it has received thus far.
Like critic A.O. Scott from The New York Times has said about the film, it is incredibly "hard to stop thinking about." Todd Field has crafted a delicate, edgy suburban drama with some remarkable performances. Every actor holds their own so well that even the great Jennifer Connelly is overshadowed by the rest of the supporting cast. Kate Winslet and Patrick Wilson play the adulterous lead characters particularly convincingly, yet the supporting cast are the standouts here. Jackie Earle Haley deserves all the awards attention he is getting and more for his role as Ronnie J. McGorvey, a convicted sex offender. Noah Emmerich is fantastic as Larry, an ex-cop who has good intentions but comes across as a bully, and Phyllis Somerville is equally brilliant as May, Ronnie's elderly mother. While Haley is getting well deserved awards and nominations, Emmerich and Somervile have not received much recognition for their standout performances
Field shows a lot of thought in his directing work, placing a large amount of symbolism throughout the film, a reason for repeat viewings. He paints the screen with a bright, intense visual style that gives the painful reality of the movie a satirical tone. Also aiding this tone is the use of a narrator, telling the story in a way that resembles a children's book. The narration takes a little time to get used to, but it only adds to the genius of Little Children. For instance, the narrator suddenly disappears when the character of Ronnie is introduced, allowing the audience to judge him themselves. The narrator reappears only as Ronnie's mother is introduced, when we know his character enough to judge him accurately. We come to realize that everyone in the story has considerable character flaws, yet Ronnie is the only individual who openly acknowledges them. Little Children is one of the best films of 2006, and deserves so much more attention than what it has received thus far.