Lost Classic: Far From Heaven

The camera opens with a shot of bright red autumn. The music plays softly and then swells as the credits roll and the shot gently sweeps down to reveal the quiet streets of an American town. Behatted men and women stroll the pavement in long coats as tail-finned cars painted in clean primary colours pass them by.

Everything about this film’s aesthetic – from clothes worn to sweeping score and the camera work, and even the font of its opening credits – screams the 1950s. Yet the Far From Heaven, written and directed by Todd Haynes, came out in 2002. It is a tribute to the films of that era, in particular the melodramas, but also a searing look at the deeply repressive social norms of the period.

The film centres around Cathy Whitaker, played superbly by Julianne Moore, who seems so much the perfect 1950s housewife that she could have been mass-produced from a quality-controlled factory mould. Indeed, she and her clean-cut high-powered husband, Frank Whitaker (Dennis Quaid), are even nicknamed Mr and Mrs Magnatec as they star as the ideal couple in his company’s ads.

Cathy also has two children, one boy one girl, and the boy in particular seems to have been ripped from an Archie comic with his slicked down hair and aww-shucksing. She is also attended by a respectful black maid, Sybil (Viola Davis), and in the garden works her new black gardener, Raymond Deagan (Dennis Haysbert).

Inevitably, given the themes and subject matter, it is set in an affluent New England suburb. And in setting the scene the film almost lays it on a little too thick.

Still, it works. There is no ironic archness to it or knowing judgement from the perspective of our more enlightened sensibilities. All too often, directors, seeking to help us sympathise with characters who exist in a time whose mores were very different to our own, give their leads moral instincts that align with those of their audiences, or at least let the lead be easily converted to these values.

There is little of that in this film, as its heroes confront desires that were utterly taboo at the time, namely homosexual and interracial attraction and love. Most characters simply do not understand, not so much due to personal evil but just because they are too shocked – and too casually prejudiced – to do so. The taboo breakers face gossipy hostility, shunning, and even low-level violence.

Even the characters who do defy objectionable values of their period in one way are not made to become similarly enlightened with regards to other areas, though Cathy at least tries to be kind.

Indeed, they remain in many ways still trapped by the stifling values of their time. Their desires are explicitly stated only occasionally. Instead, Cathy, Frank, and their contemporaries talk of having “problems” and “friendships” – or “it”. What is said is less important than what is left unspoken – Moore, Quaid, and Haysbert are masters at letting subtle expressions or brief glances do the talking.

The film thrums with a constant sense of underlying tension. Even at their most exposed, characters are often still stifled by their period’s demand for restraint, expressing their emotions often only in short violent outbursts which are instantly pulled back from.

Instead of through words, unease, shock, and fear are conveyed via the exquisite camerawork: shots suddenly slant at an angle in key scenes, conveying the sense of a world pushed suddenly out of its rigid alignment. The music, a luxurious orchestral score so characteristic of the films of this period, also does a lot of the heavy lifting, conveying emotions that can only flicker across the characters’ faces, or be communicated with minutely timed silences.

Far From Heaven is stronger for this restraint. The challenge of conveying so much while playing such stifling roles lets the actors’ skills shine through. It also is integral to the themes of the film which, ironically, explores the repressive nature of the society it depicts even as it lovingly pays tribute to its artistic sensibilities.