Little Children movie review - Aussieboyreviews
IS LITTLE CHILDREN A PSYCHOLOGICAL STORY OF SEXUAL FRUSTRATION?
Little Children is a suburban adult story of sexual frustration, yearning and makes the point of what it means to be human. It would be unfair to call Todd Field’s film nothing less than exceptional and extraordinary.
Storyline
The suburban lives of two adulterous spouses from seperate marriages, a convicted sex offender, and a dishonoured former police officer intersect as they each struggle to resist their temptations.
Movie Images
Movie details
Director: Todd Field
Cast: Kate Winslet, Patrick Wilson, Jackie Earle Haley, Jennifer Connelly, Noah Emmerich, Gregg Edelman, Phyllis Somerville
Writer: Todd Field, Tom Perrotta
Release Date (Australia): 8 February 2007
Runtime: 137 minutes/2h 17m
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: USA
Language: English
CONTENT GUIDE (warning: May contain spoilers)
The film features sexual themes that are strong in impact and contains thematic content relating to infidelity, adultery, pedophilia, sexual abuse and a man implicitly castrating himself.
A man is depicted with blood detail around his crotch after he implicitly castrates himself.
The word “f**k” is used multiple times throughout the film.
None.
The film features breasts and buttocks nudity during sex scenes.
The film contains scenes in which a man and woman are depicted engaging in sexual activity, as well as depictions of men masturbating. The film also contains frequent sexual references.
mpaa rating
R (for strong sexuality and nudity, language and some disturbing content)
Aussie boy's thoughts
This sexual drama offers an adult story of infidelity, hunger and adultery, with a suburban setting similar to American Beauty. But American Beauty was a movie more about relationships, marriage, life and lust. Little Children still focuses on the mature sexual themes of American Beauty, but instead of looking at the sexually frustrated life of Lester Burnham and his attraction towards an underage girl, all you really need to know is that this movie decides to watch two unhappy spouses in seperate marriages meet and have an affair, in addition to touching on the life of a convicted sex offender and the character of a former police officer with a grim past.
One could decide that while it’s the little children in the film that bring the adult characters together, therefore clarifying the film/novel’s title, it’s more because the adults in this story are like little children themselves; immature and irresponsible. But the performances of Kate Winslet and Patrick Wilson are so convincing and real, that this movie makes you care about these characters like they’re real suburban people facing issues that a lot of us could picture ourselves struggling with. There’s often scenes without dialogue, where the actors are still able to send off visual lines to the audiences with their faces, and it can also result from the brilliant direction as well.
When you’re sitting in your seat watching Little Children, the fact that the pacing isn’t utterly quick and the story takes its time to unfold will definitely cross your mind. However, there aren’t any periods of time that feel unnecessary; no identifiable scene could use a real trimming. Numerous scenes depicting lustful sexual activity between the two main characters take place throughout the film, but those sequences aren’t just for the fun of having sex scenes in the movie; they actually have a purpose to the story.
As well as focusing on two unfaithful spouses having an affair, Little Children also has a fairly significant subplot that alines up next to the main story that regards a convicted sex offender who is actually a pedophile. This sick man is played by Jackie Earle Haley, who despite having a less major role in the film as Winslet and Wilson, honestly gives the best performance out of the cast. And despite exposing himself to a young child in the past, this movie still paints him as a human and even makes you care for him and his elderly mother. Although it may be a movie that’s uncomfortable to sit through at times, it’s dramatic, humorous, entertaining and has a decent message, which makes it worth a watch mainly for adults.
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