Flying Lessons (Derek Magyar, 2010): USA

Reviewed by Danae Thomas. Viewed at The Santa Barbara International Film Festival, Arlington Theater.

Flying Lessons (Derek Magyar 2010) being his first film as a director starts off  with an attractive blond girl Sophie who finds out her boyfriend is kicking her out of their home. She decided to move back home with her mother who has an alcohol problem and we can see this by her drinking wine in a majority of shots she’s in. Sophie finds a job working for a retired police officer with Alzheimer’s and becomes quite close to him as they spend more time together. I believe this film is about discovering yourself and facing your fears as Sophie does throughout the film by spending time with the retired officer Harry, spending time with her ex boyfriend Billy and talking about the death of her father with her mother. Sophie’s development as a character changes from being dark and a self centered person to being able to be vulnerable and talk to her mother about their family dynamics. I thought that this film had good concepts but could have been developed in a better way by keeping the audience more entertained as I found myself getting bored and the people seated around me loosing interest while watching the long scenes where nothing exciting or interesting would be happening.

The actress Maggie Grace played a somewhat mediocre performance of her character Sophie and we can see this by her face being a void of expression. This makes it almost nearly impossible to know what she’s feeling in a certain scene especially the scenes shot between her and Billy. When Sophie is with her mother we can tell by looking at her face that she’s angry but when she speaks we can’t believe that she’s truly angry.

The cinematography in this film started off excellent in the beginning of the film where we have a shot of a pool table set in a bar. There’s fast paced dancing music in the background and its low key lighting which sets the mood for a bar location. We get a tracking shot of a blond girl walking outside where we are suddenly caught aware in the unnatural extremely bright sunlight. This beginning deceives the audience right away starting off with excellent cinematography turning into mediocre cinematography. After that scene at the bar there aren’t any more uses of high or low key lighting and we are left with the reverse shots of Sophie and the important conversations she has with the valuable people surrounding her.

There are specific patterns going on in this film such as Sophie having a lot of disagreements with the people surrounding her in this film such as; Sophie’s ex boyfriend Billy, Sophie’s mother, Sophie’s boss Steven, and her childhood friend. Of course the falling out of Sophie and the personal people in her life are conventions of a Drama film so we are expected for arguments to occur.

Themes are also displayed in this film the one’s I specifically noticed were the feeling of unhappiness as Sophie, her mother, Billy, Harry, and her friend all share in this film. Sophie is unhappy because of what happened to her father, Sophie’s mother is insecure in herself, Billy is not proud of his father but misses him at the same time, Harry misses his daughter Lucy, and Sophie’s friend is envious of Sophie’s free spirited lifestyle. All of these characters share this feeling of sorrow in their lives which connects them all together throughout this film