Living is a film about, well, just that – living. Through the life of its main character, a quiet and unassuming man who, almost too late, realizes that he has set his personal goalposts too short. For a very long time, he has not put in the requisite effort or much effort at all to make his life meaningful in any way. He has plodded and endured but not striven.
This new movie is an updated English take on Akira Kurasawa’s 1952 classic, Ikiru, which translates as “to live”. Ikiru was set in contemporary postwar Tokyo, i.e. about 1952; and Living takes place in postwar London, circa 1953. Each of these two stories depicts a time and place requiring great organizational efforts to clean up the wreckage of WWII, and both focus on the dehumanizing effects that large bureaucracies may have on the humans within them. This could be a deadly dull topic, but fortunately both pictures feature great performances by their lead actors. In Ikiru, it is Takashi Shimura [Rashoman (1950), The Seven Samurai (1954)]; In Living, it is Bill Nighy [State of Play (2003), Page 8 (2011)]. The writing is also quite good in both. Indeed, the screenplay in Living is written/reimagined by Nobel and Booker Prize winning author Kazuo Ishiguro [The Remains of the Day (1993), Never Let Me Go (2010)]. While Oliver Hermanus, the director of the new film does not (yet) have the stature or resume of the great Kurosawa, he certainly holds his own with this update.
Thematically, both films indict the soul-destroying effect of conformity in general and bureaucratic (and by extension, corporate) life in particular, an idea which was epitomized in the U.S. a few years later by the novel and film “The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit.” The Organization Man sees himself as an inconsequential cog in a giant homogenous machine, where taking no action is far safer than taking responsibility. But the protagonists in these two stories come to doubt this notion of “safety”. Ikuru is the rawer film, and perhaps the more passionate. But, to my modern sensibilities, it feels overly melodramatic and immoderately political. By contrast, Living focusses more subtly on the personal and, to me, is more satisfying.
Living begins on a gray morning with a stream of men, all similarly suited in a most conservative manner, looking remarkably alike – at least superficially. They are walking to the local rail station for the daily commute to work in London. On the train, several of them congregate in the front corner of one car. Turns out all these fellows are colleagues in the Public Affairs department at County Hall - seat of the London County Council and the center of London’s massive, overstuffed and seemingly overburdened postwar city bureaucracy. Overhearing their chat, young Peter Wakeling [Alex Sharp -
The Trial of the Chicago Seven (2021)] soon joins the group and with a surprising eagerness introduces himself. It’s Wakeling’s first day on the job and he has has done his homework, remarking that he can’t wait to meet Williams, the head of Public Affairs, who has become something of a legend in his mind. From the dry, phlegmatic response of his soon to be peers, we get a less hopeful perspective about him.
This is a rather oblique introduction to Williams (Nighy), who is, in fact, the center of the story.
As the men arrive for work; he is already at his manager’s desk at the head of a crowded u-shaped group of other desks, where the men all take their seats. This is not the digital age. There are stacks of documents and folders everywhere – on every desk, on shelves and tables, everywhere. His subordinates see their boss as stiff, colorless, old fashioned, but also as an encyclopedic civil service veteran who is the last word on matters of departmental procedure and responsibilities. Controversy is to be avoided and purview defined as narrowly as possible to that end. An example of this (depicted here and in
Ikiru): a group of earnest, clamorous women arrive with a petition urging the office to clean up a rubble-strewn lot and build a much needed playground for their neighborhood's children. Told that this is the wrong department, they are shunted off to Public Works, who sends them to Community Development, who directs them to Parks and Rec, and so forth until they are referred back to Public Affairs. When their file is again presented to Williams, he parks it in one of many piles, saying “we’ll just put it here; no harm done.”
Williams is so dull as to be something of a mystery. He doesn’t speak much, but when he does his speech reflects little personality, his voice a softspoken, knowledgeable, monotone, almost a whisper. Indeed, no one in Public Relations speaks much; the office is a sober, quiet place – all about processing the files, pushing papers. The only member of this crew showing any sort of animation is the sole woman in the group, Miss Harris, who will occasionally crack a joke or make a comment, trying to liven things up. This is frowned upon. Miss Harris, warmly played by Aimee Lou Wood [
Sex Education (2019 – 2021)], has plans to leave the deadly-dull office for a less dreary job.
Williams has a reputation for regularity. Never misses a day, never cracks a smile. When he abruptly gets up and leaves a few hours early one day - citing an appointment – it causes a stir, or rather a bit of murmuring. From this point forward, Williams, in his quiet way, is very much the center of our attention. And after a somewhat slow beginning, it’s at this point the story really begins to take hold and get interesting.
The appointment is with a physician. As Williams sits stoically, the doctor gives him bad news: his test results came back, and the prognosis isn’t good. There’s nothing to be done. He has roughly six months to live. Although he takes this news quietly, we see for the first time a flicker of emotion - pain, fear, maybe a little panic – in Williams’ otherwise impassive face. It is subtle but it is there. And this is where we begin to appreciate Bill Nighy’s command of his craft: a blink, a nearly imperceptible eye movement, the slightest shift in posture, an almost inaudible of discomfort in his voice – a change so delicate, I wondered if I was imagining it, projecting how I might have felt. But this is Nighy’s gift, low key but beautiful and convincing.
Williams does not return to work. Home is not much better. He’s either all alone – his wife having died a couple decades ago – or sharing his small home with his son and daughter-in-law neither of whom seem to care for his company and with whom he is disinclined to share his morbid news, much less his sentiments. He has no friends with whom to discuss his intimate feelings. Which are what, exactly? He’s not clear on that either. But, as you’d imagine, he needs to talk to someone. At random, he takes himself to a seaside resort and latches on to a stranger, Sutherland [Tom Burke –
Mank (2020)], to whom he confesses his diagnosis and a profound regret that he has wasted so much of his life walled off from his self (whatever that is) and from the reality of living. Sutherland, a dissolute writer, offers to show Williams how to live for pleasure – taking him to bars, nightclubs, strip joints, and the like. These adventures get Williams terribly drunk, but hedonism is no tonic for him.
Days later, back in London, he bumps into Ms. Harris (a.k.a. Margaret), now a waitress with hopes of moving into management. It is a fortuitous bump. Williams is charmed by her exuberance and vivacity. Margaret is everything he’s not: friendly, ambitious, emotionally open, curious, optimistic, compassionate. Talking with her even makes him smile and laugh. He feels a compulsion to spend more time with her. It’s not for sex or romance; it's just, he has been living in the desert, and she’s a drink of cool water. As a child, he explains, his highest ambition was to be a gentleman – well mannered, well dressed, respected; but that’s a superficial aspiration without content or meaning. Since the death of his wife, his sole aim has been to avoid further heartbreak, and to eschew any commitment or action that could result in disappointment. Margaret does not live in fear; she is engaged with life, and he is not. “I want to be like you,” Williams confesses – and he means it.
And that gives him an idea. Williams has been absent from work for quite some time. Out of the blue, and with no explanation, he returns to the office, this time with a newfound zeal, shocking to his colleagues and his staff. He remembers the ladies and their playground project. At about this point, without explanation, Living moves into its third and final act with a move taken directly from Kurusawa - a surprising cinematic shift of time and perspective.
Essentially, the film is a parable meant to explore the meaning of its title and related themes. Hermanus, the director, says, “At its heart, this is a story about death affirming life.” Says Nighy, “The film is about how we deal with mortality, and how to best appreciate the time we are given.“ And Ishiguro notes that the essence of the story is about “finding a different model of facing up to the impact of your life on the world, one not dependent on what other people think of you, but on what you do privately. … What’s important is that you have a very personal sense of triumph for yourself. It might be something very humble [and] no one may remember you for it, but it will matter to you.”
Living may matter to you a little as well, thematically and dramatically. It’s a small film but quite a good one. Seemingly a downer at first, but with a provocative, moving conclusion. I suspect it will stay with you awhile. In a good way. Sometimes it’s the quiet ones that deserve the most attention.
1 hour 42 minutes
Grade: A-
Living is now playing in select theaters nationwide, including New York City, Chicago (Orland Park) and Los Angeles. Rolling out to more theaters and cities beginning January 6, 2023, including San Francisco (Opera Plaza 1/6, Regal Stonestown 1/27), and elsewhere, including other SF Bay Area cities 1/13, 1/20 and 1/27. For a city and theater in your area, click HERE.
Ikiru, if you'd like to see the original, is available free on HBO Max or with a subscription to The Criterion Channel or Kanopy and for rent ($3.99) on Amazon, AppleTV+, and other services.
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