FILM
LIVING IS EASY WITH EYES CLOSED ★★★☆
(M) Selected release (108 minutes)
Spanish filmmaker David Trueba takes elements of a true story – a school teacher who uses Beatles lyrics to help his students learn English, and John Lennon's 1966 visit to Spain to act in a film – and winds them into a disarming, delicately observed road movie about decisions, opportunities and the nature of freedom.
Javier Camara, an Almodovar regular, plays the teacher, who embarks on his quest to meet Lennon and discuss his lyrics. He picks up two runaways on the trip: a teenage boy (Francesc Colomer) who has left home over a dispute about haircuts, and a pregnant young woman (Natalia de Molina) who isn't prepared to accept her fate.
Trueba's vision is tender, sharp and poignant. It's a project that could easily be weighed down with nostalgia or over-determination, but there's a generosity and humour about the performances and the direction that keep the film light and buoyant.
Yet there is a gravity to Living Is Easy With Eyes Closed, a sense that there are things at stake for all the characters. And as a carrier of meaning, the figure of Lennon is used deftly and gracefully to the very last.
