The Lovers * * * *

My lover is better than your lover

Here's another one I caught with some friends at MIFF. It'll probably be released in the near future.
A couple in their late fifties, early sixties, have each taken respective lovers.  You sense they each know about it too, but it becomes something they don’t talk about. The elephant in the room.
Though in both cases I don’t know what their respective lovers see in them.  Michael is an out of shape grumpy old bugger who picks up a ballet teacher, whilst Mary picks up a man at least ten years younger with a promising writing career ahead of him.  
I don’t know why they’d be attracted to them.  Michael’s ballet teaching girlfriend is neurotic and irritatingly dependent. Mary’s writer boyfriend is a chain smoking self obsessed narcissist.  
All in all, no one here is what you'd call a great catch.
Maybe it’s because of the obvious faults of their lovers that Michael and Mary find themselves attracted to each other again. It’s an old story: ignoring your loved one till someone else wants them, then suddenly they’re gorgeous.

Then their son comes back home to visit with his new girlfriend. He’s a surly boy who seems to have been disappointed with his parents for a long time and expects to be again. But he finds his parents seemingly in the bloom of love and incapable of keeping their hands off each other.
However, even though Michael and Mary are enjoying a second honeymoon, their self-centered  lovers are still out there and likely to turn up anytime to set the cat among the pigeons….

I quite enjoyed The Lovers, partly because of it's quiet and restrained narrative.  It's not an expensive production. The acting is very good and characters well developed and completely believable. Michael and Mary dress regularly (no designer wardrobes here), they have regular medium pay, medium responsibility jobs, they work in office cubicles that aren’t too flash. Their house is suburban.  
They’re making mistakes but these are normal folk and ultimately they deserved the happy ending the film gives them.