Center of the story, the couple Tom and Gerri, goes along with each other perfectly well, however the sound of their names combined together might suggest trouble in the classic cat and mouse cartoon. Over 40 years into their marriage, Tom and Gerri still has the same respect and care for each other. They are loving parents to their 30 years old son, Joe, who is a lawyer, a sensible and independent man.
The warmth and comfort of the family serves as refuge for their friends and relatives who are doing not so well in life. Gerri's friend at work Mary, Tom's confidant Ken and his older brother Ronnie, could be everyone around us in real life. Facing the Inevitably reality of growing old alone, Mary has nothing but her looks, on which she is gradually losing grip, and Ken is also single, banned from the pubs where he drunk away his life, because now everything including the pubs is designed for young people , as to the recently bereaved Ronnie, life has lost its purpose, he looks nothing more than a walking corpse.
Such is life. Someones are lucky, some are not. But just as the vegetables Gerri and Tom dutifully tended in their allotment garden with their yearly ritual of seed, growth, ripening and harvest, life also has its way of development- birth, grow up, leave home, fall in love, set up a family, age and ultimately, death. Almost all these elements can be seen in this melodrama.
One of Mike Leigh's characteristics is he likes to leave an open ending. Just as Lesley Manville, the director's long-time associate who played Mary in “another year” said in an interview after the film's screening at Cannes Film Festival that she likes to think everything is “up for grabs”. Happiness is possible if you do not miss out on the chances.
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