I walked into Philomena tonight knowing only that it’s a best picture nominee, the only one I’d not yet seen. Shameful, I know — your intrepid scribe wholly uninformed and caught riding the Academy’s sateen coattails — but there it was. Also, it’s been playing at the single-screen cinema on my block for literally months, so you might say I finally caved. Either way, the film is a delight. I saw it cold, and so should you.
If you must know a little about it first: Judi Dench plays Philomena Lee, an Irish woman who’s decided to look for the son she gave up for adoption 50 years ago. Through a chance encounter she teams up with journalist Martin Sixsmith (a wry Steve Coogan), and this quaint duo together chase down leads, starting at the stern Catholic convent where young Philomena bore her child.
Dench is delightful. The story is true and stranger than fiction — read it here if you’d like, though I very much enjoyed watching it unfold — and the film is a surprisingly moving yet perennially buoyant little tale that richly deserves all the accolades it will no doubt receive. While I’m ashamed to have passed on seeing this for so long — especially to gargle such truly gruesome slop — I’m thoroughly warmed to have seen it now and I recommend it most highly indeed.
Haus Verdict: This won’t win best picture but probably should. Whatever’s keeping you from seeing this, you’re flat wrong. A truly splendid film.
It is fantastic, but you don’t think “12 Years” isn’t a landmark, and this superior, film?