I liked A Single Man. I enjoyed the intense over art-directing, and tight, tight palette of colors, especially in the segments in which George tries to slog through a day in his beautifully manicured 1961 universe. There is some integrity in such a very art-directed world, not to mention George's collision with cultural benchmarks (the Psycho poster), I think, for describing the gay experience, especially at that time. It does get a little diffuse emotionally, in a way that felt very first-film to me. I would have enjoyed a mastery of the emotional temperature to match everything else. Especially as the score was very charged and a little sloppy in contrast. It was a lovely film, though.

Not as lovely: the late-arriving Starbucks-drinking woman next to me with her rattling shopping bags and constant commentary to her friend. Whom I shushed. And the cellphone she had to be told to turn off by the pissed-off boys behind me, whom I thumbs-upped. OH THE AGONIES.