The Child in Time (Movie Review)

Adapted from Ian McEwan’s Whitbread Prize winning novel, and directed by Julian Farino (The Newsroom, Entourage), The Child In Time is a lyrical and heart-breaking exploration of love, loss and the power of things unseen.

 

Benedict Cumberbatch (Sherlock, Parade’s End) stars as Stephen Lewis, a successful writer of children’s books, who is confronted with the unthinkable: the loss of a child.

 

With tenderness and insight, the film explores the dark territory of a marriage devastated by the loss of a child. Kate’s absence sets Stephen and his wife on diverging paths as both struggle with an all-consuming grief. With the passage of time, a balance of sorts returns, until hope surfaces and triumphs unexpectedly.

 

So, this was part of review package I received from PBS and I was immediately intrigued when I noticed it starred Benedict Cumberbatch, but I was also a bit hesitant because, honestly, his movies can go either way for me. It was pretty much the same with Kelly Macdonald.

Here’s what the film’s about. When Stephen Lewis loses his young daughter in a grocery store, he and his wife are thrown into a tailspin of grief. As the years tick on, he and his wife bounce back and forth searching for a bit of hope until they find it in an unexpected way.

Okay, so I spent the majority of this movie wondering why a father would deem it fit to let their three-year-old daughter wonder to the front of the grocery store by the doors while they were still at the cash register ringing up and paying for their groceries. Seriously, you would leave your crap and go get your kid.

I wasn’t impressed with this one. It sort of felt like this was one of those movies that kept going but didn’t go anywhere. I think I was expecting something different more along the lines of a mystery type rather than what felt like an odd study of human emotions.

Mixed in with the anguish and guilt is a side story involving the mental breakdown of Stephen’s editor as well as what I can only describe as a bit of woo-woo involving a place Stephen had thought he had been before but had only been there in utero. Yeah, like I said, it was an odd movie.

This was one of those come to your own conclusion movies as nothing about Kate’s disappearance is addresses. I have my own thoughts regarding what happened and that’s all I’m going to have.

Overall, this was 90 minutes I’ll never get back. I had intended to read the book this was based on but that’s not going to happen now for fear of wasting more of my time.

What’s the last movie or show you’ve enjoyed?