Revolutionary Road (2008)

“How do you break free without breaking apart?”

Revolutionary Road

Based on the novel by Richard Yates, Revolutionary Road tells the story of Frank (Leonardo DiCaprio) and April (Kate Winslet) Wheeler, a suburban couple in 1955 America that live a seemingly perfect life. However, their outwardly pleasant life has come at a cost – April has foregone her dream of becoming an actress in exchange for becoming a suburban housewife, and Frank spends his hours working at a job he hates and is unable to figure out what his passion in life is. The two decide that moving to Paris will give their lifestyle a breath of fresh air and give their relationship and family much-needed rejuvenation, and they prepare to leave behind life as they know it in the States for a new European life. However, as their circumstances change and unexpected developments occur, the Wheelers are forced to confront the crossroads they face and decide what path they want to take as individuals, as lovers, and as family.

I actually didn’t know anything about the plot when I went to go see this movie. I had heard good things about the movie so that was a factor in wanting to see it in theaters, but my main reason for going was to see Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio reunited on the big screen (it’s been 11 years since Titanic!) Also, both Kate and Leo are absolutely fantastic actors, and I knew that no matter what the movie was about, those two would deliver a stellar performance.

The rest of this post is my opinion about the movie and contains spoilers.

I wasn’t wrong in that regard. Kate and Leo both delivered incredibly powerful performances as Frank and April, and you could definitely get a sense of being trapped in the idyllic suburban life they had created for themselves, and the feeling of losing time before all chances to get out were gone. However, and this is not to undermine Kate and Leo’s performances, you could definitely tell that Revolutionary Road was based on a book because of all of the internal struggle that Frank and April went through. Since I haven’t read the book, I can’t judge how accurate the book-to-movie adaptation was, but I do wonder if some of the book characterization was left out of the movie version because it’s hard to translate every internal struggle a character in a book experiences to the big screen.

I was disappointed with the beginning of the movie, however. It felt different than the rest of the movie, and while it showed what caused Frank and April to feel so trapped in their lives (conforming to the “perfect” American household image, April giving up her dreams of acting because she fell pregnant, Frank working to provide for his family at a job he hates) it just didn’t seem to match the path that the movie eventually took. I particularly didn’t like the scene where Frank took out the secretary from work for drinks and ended up sleeping with her, if only because that entire sequence seemed out of place in the movie.

I thought it was very ironic that John Givings (Michael Shannon), the clinically insane son of Helen and Howard Givings, was the only character that wasn’t afraid to get straight to the truth, even if it was distorted, awful, and ugly, yet he was considered as crazy by society and had to undergo electroshock therapy in an attempt to return him to normalcy. Yes, there were times when John was unforgivably rude in certain scenes, but he was still the only character that never lied and was completely and totally honest from the minute he appeared on screen.

The final few scenes of this movie were haunting. From the moment when April went upstairs to give herself an abortion, to Frank’s anxious and tense wait in the hospital waiting room after April was rushed to the emergency room, and to Helen Givings talking about the new couple that moved into the house on Revolutionary Road after April and Frank left (irony of ironies, the new young couple look like a photocopy of Frank and April), all the emotions felt and decisions made by the characters throughout the course of the movie all collided and the final scenes were the inevitable results of the character’s actions. I was spellbound as the movie ended and the credits began to roll, and definitely, those closing scenes were my favorite throughout the movie.

Overall Rating: 8.5/10

Tags: movies