If anyone on here has not yet seen A Single Man, you are doing yourself a serious disservice. I think it's a wonderful film, and if it's not a big contender for next year's Best Picture and Best Actor nods, I'll be extremely disappointed.

I had grown quite weary of the way Hollywood usually deals with homosexuality and had especially avoided comedies where the main source of humor seemed to be gay stereotypes. A Single Man, on the other hand, creates an extraordinarily believable rendering of the struggles that the Colin Firth character experiences in dealing with the untimely death of his partner. It's all done in a perfectly executed environment of the early 1960's, so this film will mean even more to those who were around during that era.

There is a single shot early in the film where we see him getting the news in a phone call that his lover has died, and the minute or two in which we see the emotions play wordlessly across Firth's face compare favorably to the 4 minute silent vignette in Up where Carl and Ellie's marriage is documented. Simply exquisite, and deeply moving. I have no clue how they were able to do that.

My one quibble with the director's choices is that he seems to have worked a bit too hard to avoid even a hint of frontal nudity, in spite of the fact that there is significant backal (heh) skin on display. The nudity is not at all gratuitous and none carries even the slightest intent to titillate, but I think the film would have been better if they had allowed themselves to be more relaxed about angles. As criticisms go, though, this is the smallest of nits.

Please don't miss this one.

Dan