The Mother (2003)

77% of critics liked it
(88 reviews)
61% of users liked it
(2,854 ratings)

Hanif Kureishi wrote this drama about a woman whose late-blooming romance causes a serious rift with her family. May (Anne Reid) and Toots (Peter Vaughan) are an elderly couple who travel to London to visit their two grown children, Bobby (Steven Mackintosh) and Paula (Cathryn Bradshaw). While Bobby… More Hanif Kureishi wrote this drama about a woman whose late-blooming romance causes a serious rift with her family. May (Anne Reid) and Toots (Peter Vaughan) are an elderly couple who travel to London to visit their two grown children, Bobby (Steven Mackintosh) and Paula (Cathryn Bradshaw). While Bobby tries to be attentive to his parents, he's busy with his two young children, a major project at work, and completing some renovations on his large and expensive house, while his wife, Helen (Anna Wilson-Jones), shows little interest in her in-laws. Meanwhile, Paula is unsatisfied with her work and carries on an affair with Darren (Daniel Craig), a builder who is working on Bobby's home. When Toots suddenly dies, May moves in with Paula, but with Paula at work all day, she has little to do. Darren stops by Paula's flat periodically, and soon he strikes up a friendship with May; their conversations soon develop into flirtation, and before long, the two have become lovers, meeting regularly for afternoon trysts in Paula's spare room. While May's relationship with Darren makes her feel happier and more alive than she has in years, it leads to an ugly confrontation when Paula learns about the affair. The Mother was screened as part of the Director's Fortnight series at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

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Rating, Runtime: R, 1 hr. 52 min.
Directed By: Roger Michell, E. Roger Mitchell
Written By: Hanif Kureishi
Genres: Drama

In Theaters: May 28, 2004 Limited
On DVD: Oct 12, 2004
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics

Critic Reviews

Eleanor Ringel Gillespie, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A troubling film about the need to be wanted.
Peter Rainer, New York Magazine
There is in The Mother a rich understanding of where old age takes you. Along with the myth that seniors don't have sex drives, the film dispels a larger one: that the years bring wisdom.
Jay Boyar, Orlando Sentinel
It challenges you to figure out how you feel about the people on the screen -- emotionally, intellectually, morally.
Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press
It sounds like the stuff of soap operas or bad porn, but Kureishi's script is too intelligent and empathetic to titillate.
Geoff Pevere, Toronto Star
Uses the surface familiarity of its situation ... to smuggle an elegantly carved Trojan horse full of messy emotional spillover into the theatre.
Jennie Punter, Globe and Mail
The complications of its story are found in the deep complexities of emotions and family relationships.
David Noh, Film Journal International
Isn't very exciting or involving.
Victoria Alexander, FilmsInReview.com
A bold, challenging performance by Anne Reid.
Nathaniel Rogers, Film Experience
...extremely well-played in individual scenes. But much of the film feels counterintuitive to the general thrust of the narrative.
Sarah Chauncey, Reel.com
Michell [allows] the audience to suspend what is likely the most vehement of disbelief and to start feeling that this odd relationship is, in fact, rather sweet.
Ed Gonzalez, Slant Magazine
Yes, folks, people over 50 still like to get their groove on.
Paul Doro, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Complex characters, constrained emotions, an intelligent screenplay and a candid, audacious examination of the burgeoning sexuality of a woman in her 60s.
Michael Ferraro, Film Threat
This is a very solid little film that would be perfect to those of you who are beyond tired of this summer's attack of mindless entertainment.
Philip Martin, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
...hard to watch but it as honest as it is emotionally grueling.
Jeff Vice, Deseret News, Salt Lake City
This British drama gets increasingly lurid as it goes. And its handling of risque material is sensationalistic, even exploitative.
Sean Means, Salt Lake Tribune
Director Roger Michell shoots in stately poses that are artful to the point of distraction.
Robert W. Butler, Kansas City Star
It's a superb character study, with veteran actress Anne Reid delivering a heartbreaking and curiously liberating performance.

Read all 17 critic reviews

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Featured Audience Ratings

vieras e

I'm happy if I never have to see this again. It's not the older woman/younger man set up, it's not the elderly nudity. No, what bothers me is that a mother could do that to her own daughter. Not to mention how Darren treated the poor old woman. I could feel her pain… More
I'm happy if I never have to see this again. It's not the older woman/younger man set up, it's not the elderly nudity. No, what bothers me is that a mother could do that to her own daughter. Not to mention how Darren treated the poor old woman. I could feel her pain and fear of becoming yet another "invisible old lady whose life is more or less over", but the way she went about fixing it just wasn't right.
paul s

a controversial film that is more than the sum of its theme. I often felt like I was outside of this film, looking in; and I believe that sense of alienation was by design. It does an expert view of showing a woman, May, who had never really questioned her wifely duties (although,… More
a controversial film that is more than the sum of its theme. I often felt like I was outside of this film, looking in; and I believe that sense of alienation was by design. It does an expert view of showing a woman, May, who had never really questioned her wifely duties (although, apparently didn't do that great a job of raising her daughter, who claimed she was never given the love and support she needed). When May and her husband arrive in London to visit their children, it seems like the world is going on around them and they can only watch. When the husband dies, May refuses to live in the family home, so comes to London to live with her children. She begins to feel the freedom and the breathtaking concept that she can now do what she wants, when she wants - and ends up taking a lover with none other than James Bond (Daniel Craig), who is a carpenter working on her son's flat. The sex scenes come across very real and poignant, especially May's confession that she felt that she might never be touched again. The tension comes from the fact that Craig is May's daughter's lover. The daughter is a needful thing, always turning the conversation towards herself (even while saying to May, "enough about you, what about me" - yikes!) - and their struggle over Craig fills the remainder of the film (all done in subterfuge and typical Brittish upper lip). When all the plot devices collide and May is forced (though it appears to be her choice) to return to the family digs - she walks through her son's house, much as she entered it - with their lives going on around and without her. Undeterred, she is home just long enough to pack her bags so she can take a cruise; thus getting on with her life and continuing to "become", rather than waiting to die.
Ross C

Soap-style British chick-flick that's pleasant enough background viewing until the graphic Daniel Craig on grandmother sex scene...
Walter M

[font=Century Gothic][color=darkslategray]"The Mother" starts out with a retired couple visiting their grown children in the big city, London. The visit ends on a tragic note when the father dies suddenly. At a loss at what to do next, the mother(Anne Reid) returns to… More
[font=Century Gothic][color=darkslategray]"The Mother" starts out with a retired couple visiting their grown children in the big city, London. The visit ends on a tragic note when the father dies suddenly. At a loss at what to do next, the mother(Anne Reid) returns to London to stay with her son, first and then her daughter, who is a single mother, teacher, wannabe writer and is having sex with the dropout builder(Daniel Craig) of a conservatory for the son. She hopes the sex will turn into a relationship even though the mother has doubts. The daughter also pretty much blames the mother for everything that has gone wrong in her life...[/color][/font] [font=Century Gothic][color=#2f4f4f][/color][/font] [font=Century Gothic][color=#2f4f4f]"The Mother" starts promisingly as a look into a woman who now for the first time in decades is alone and has to find a direction for her new life(thus, I was expecting a searing look into how society treats its senior citizens and maybe that is how Mike Leigh would have handled it) but it quickly devolves into a lurid soap opera as most of the attention is spent on the melodrama of a love triangle. Even worse, the film borrows from the austere landscape of Ingmar Bergman.(I'm thinking mostly "Autumn Sonata", actually.) And there is no sense as to what the family's life was like when they were all together.(In this regards, it is bested by the superior Italian film, "Everybody's Fine" starring Marcello Mastroianni.) But the acting is excellent, though. The film is overall disapointing, being based on a screenplay by Hanif Kureishi who also penned the excellent and provocative films - "My Son, The Fanatic", "Sammy and Rosie Get Laid" and "My Beautiful Laundrette."[/color][/font] [font=Century Gothic][color=#2f4f4f][/color][/font] [font=Century Gothic][color=#2f4f4f]One line of dialogue has especially gotten on my nerves. The mother tells the daughter that they did not have feminism in her day. I don't know if things were different in England but "The Feminine Mystique" was published in 1963 and Gloria Steinem is 70. [/color][/font]
FanGirl B

My Mother didn't like this film but I did. I think it just creeped her out, I thought it was well done. Not for those who consider themselves real sensative or constrative.