Boyhood

The 12 years of Mason Jr. (2002-2014) 

     From the director of Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly, comes one of cinema's greatest achievements: Boyhood. Nominated for 6 Oscars including Best Picture. 97% Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes. 100% score on Metacritic.com. Boyhood is a film like no other. It took 12 years to complete. The film stars Patricia Arquette, Ethan Hawke (Training Day and Before Sunrise), and introducing Ellar Coltrane as the focus of our story.
     This is the life story of Mason Jr. (Coltrane), from his early childhood to his arrival at college. Filmed over the span of 12 years, Mason grows up before our eyes as he journeys through rough stages in his life like his parents' divorce, bad stepparents, falling in love and breaking up, and fighting with his older sister. Mason shall face the reality that his parents won't be together when it comes to divorce, and find his artistic voice and achieving his dream one step at a time, and also face ugly truths.
    Ever since this movie came out in 2014, I wanted to see it. Now, it's 5 years later, and I finally got to see how amazing it is. I can't believe it took that long to make a movie like Boyhood. I mean, no other director has done this before, until Richard Linklater proposed the idea in 2001. I say that it worked. It's amazing how the story progresses as the years literally pass and the actors age.
    The part that gets me was at the end of the movie when Mason leaves for college and his mom has a mental breakdown, because she was afraid of this day to come and after all that she's been through, she doesn't know what to do. This made me cry. And it worried me about when my time will come when I leave home to start a new life. After I watched the movie for the first time, I asked mom how she would feel when that day in my life comes. She replied that she would be very sad. I don't blame her.

Parents Guide: This movie is rated R. There is some sexual talk in some scenes. Major profanity in the movie. Like about 40 or more F bombs. There's a lot of arguing and there's a scene where it's implied that the stepfather hit the mother badly. In another scene, the drunk stepdad throws dishes at his wife and children. There is a scene where Mason gets bullied. There is also some drinking and cannabis smoking in the movie too. And of course, at the end is the mom's breakdown that I recently mentioned above. 

Did You Know?: The movie has no original score. The music is all popular songs. The film takes place from 2002 to 2013. There are 143 scenes in the movie. Each year of Mason's life is covered by an average 14 minutes of screen time. 

The eyes of a child.