There have been lots of films about lonely, or otherwise broken people who fall in love, and many of them work (Punch Drunk Love, The Station Agent, In the Mood For Love, heck even this year’s Bones and All come to mind). But there is an inherent trap—the film can’t seem patronizing, in a “look at the little people!” way. And we need to believe in the honesty of their connection—it can’t feel like a plot device.
Enter Sam Mendes’ Empire of Light. The film is set in 1980 at an almost impossibly grand, if slightly run-down movie theater in a small English coastal town. Hilary (Olivia Colman), a middle-aged woman who struggles with her mental health, is the manager, and Stephen (Michael Ward), a young Black man with an affinity for “Rude Boy” music, is the new hire. Giving him a tour of the theater, she takes him to the top floor, where there’s a whole secret theater and café, untouched for decades. He heals the broken wing of a bird that flies into the space (for real) and they make their way onto the rooftop. This will become their secret spot.
Hilary is having an affair, of sorts (it’s really more akin to workplace sexual harassment), with the theater’s owner (Colin Firth), who gravely asks her to join him in his office and then unceremoniously bends her over his desk. She doesn’t enjoy these encounters, but feels powerless to stop them.
Instead, she has a crush on Stephen—which is very believable. He’s extremely handsome and also very nice to her. What’s slightly less believable is that he returns her affection (this despite the fact that a much more age-appropriate coworker also seems to fancy him). What’s his deal? Well, you see, the England of 1980 is a very racist place, especially small towns like this, which is dangerous and scary for Stephen and…sends him into the arms of a middle-aged white lady? Sure, Jan.
For the record, it wouldn’t be impossible to make me believe in such an affair. But it would take the kind of specificity, care, and insight that this film is in short supply of.
Their affair is not the worst part of the film, though. It’s the fact that—wait for it—Hilary has never seen a movie! She’s too sad and busy working to sneak into a film. She doesn’t have time for the magic of the cinema, you see. I think we all know where this is going.
Empire of Light is so dewy and sentimental, it’s practically moist. What’s more, it’s almost desperate to be the kind of film that wins awards. A shame, because it wastes an excellent Colman performance (is there any other kind?) as Hilary—it’s an unflinching, compassionate, and heartbreaking depiction of mental illness—and something of a star-making turn by the charismatic Ward. And the film is populated with old pros like Firth and Toby Jones as the theater’s projectionist, never a bad thing.
But to me, Empire of Light is guilty of literally all the pitfalls of this type of endeavor. It’s force-fed whimsy. It’s trite. I didn’t even get the real sense that Mendes loves movies! All the lonely people . . . deserve better.