Living (2022)
The trailer doesn’t do it justice, suggesting a more Merchant Ivory and much sadder movie, more of another World War Two history piece. Instead, this is a reflection on what it means to die well, what our legacy will be and who we notice. When we’re gone, what difference did we really make to those around us?
In post-war Britain, all is shiny and modern (apparently) — the from the time movies don’t mention the killer smogs and fogs or show the bomb sites. This is the New Elizabethan Age and all is well. Except in the London County Council (LCC) in County Hall, where commuters are burying themselves under piles of paperwork. Bill Nighy is the impeccably bowler hatted and umbrella’d Mr Williams. Every day he and his fellow suited and hatted officer workers board their commuter train, ignore each other apart from a polite bow and a distant following in his wake, burying themselves behind newspapers as they bury themselves behind towers of paperwork and files during the day.
In the office there is a calm but chilling war between the bureaucratic departments as files are pushed backwards and forwards and generally blocked or held in a tray for centuries. Sometimes the same happens to people and their dreams of bettering a community. It’s all hierarchy, classism and faceless bureaucracy…
Yet Mr Williams is not unkind — he does his job well and dispenses wisdom on all matter of files, responsibility and rubber stamping! But not in moving ‘the ladies’ community project to fruition. New recruit, Mr Wakeling, soon learns not to chat to his colleagues on the train, not to show enthusiasm and that the ladies will be passed from bureaucratic pillar to post without end. They will never get their sewage filled bomb site turned into a playground for local children.
And yet, everything changes when Mr Williams encounters his own mortality. He has a life-threatening diagnosis — he sits reflectively in the dark terrifying his beloved son and daughter-in-law, who only seem to want his money and influence, sulking and withdrawing if they do not get what they want. Unable to share his news with them, Mr Williams flees to the seaside to try chips, women and song. Even though he encounters honest bohemian Tom Burke, even a former musketeer can’t help! But he wants deeper meaning in his life — to connect with family and leave some lasting impact for others. He also realises that he doesn’t know how to have the fun he seeks and really wants purpose and meaning beyond the office pyramid. What does it really mean to live?
Intrigued by the ambitious and modern Miss Harris, Mr Williams takes her to lunch at Fortnums where he writes her reference for a Lyons Tea House management post and enjoys her opinions on everything — from her colleagues' mannerisms to her dreams for the future. Worried that she’s being hit on or exploited, Miss Harris seeks propriety and clarification. Mr Williams confesses his terminal illness and lack of communication with his family and connection with his life until this time.
Dreams aren’t coming true — Miss Harris is not at all a manager nor is Mr Williams learning the secrets of living. He returns to the office and realises that the secret to live is to love others — namely recognising a wider need for community and enabling others to live. Personally, he propels the ladies through the bureaucratic whirl of papers and folders, brimming with kindness and gratitude and gets a good playground built for local East End children to play in, safely close to their homes.
Atlast Mr Williams finds happiness — singing in the snowfall on a swing, a song of his childhood bringing back happy memories of his mother and father, of being loved and loving.
We flash forward to Mr Williams funeral — his son is bereft and still shocked by his father turning to Miss Harris to confide in, rather than his family. Mr Williams has tried to leave another legacy — in a letter to his newest recruit, Mr Wakeling — which seems to be to seize the day, go after the girl he loves, live!
The team vow to follow Mr Williams activism — except they don’t. The rebellion is short lived as files are once again sat on, economically disadvantaged communities neglected and disempowered — back to business as usual. Mr Wakeling stands up to protest and sits down….
Very well done and not the miserable movie the trailer makes it. Even more intriguingly based on a 1952 Japanese movie based on a Russian novel! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikiru
I think it could have had more political teeth — in the Labour government world of the new NHS and welfare state, political opposites could have been played more with as a contrast with the bureaucracy. The East End community here got to stay in their new improved terraces rather than shipping out to modern and state of the art new and wanted blocks — the betrayal of lack of resourcing, facilities and decent transport networks yet to come. But it wasn’t paternalistic — the working-class community was determining its own future in this movie. Mr Williams had even accepted the temporary state of his actions — it would be changed, improved, bettered and not permanent; he had done the best in his time.
What it does do is to shock us with taboos — our own mortality, our own deaths and funerals, our own legacies; our own mortality and frailty; the film equivalent of a 17th or 18th century gravestone — as I once was, so shall you be and a skull. Plus, Bill Nighy is brilliant as ever (matched well by Aimee Lou Wood)! with his beautifully internalised gentlemanly emotions and stiff upper lip cracking bit by bit. Matched by beautiful poignant writing from Kazuo Ishiguro around the original screenplay and 1952 movie.
