Film Archive

Boyhood

Horizons 2014 / Boyhood / USA 2014

Every year beginning in 2002, Richard Linklater and the same cast returned to Austin, Texas, to shoot part of a movie about the childhood and adolescence of a boy named Mason. Thus, young actor Ellar Coltrane literally grows before our eyes from childhood into young adulthood, the characters around him transforming as well, along with the world in which they live.

Synopsis

Three films on the love between Jesse and Céline – in its own way, the trilogy Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, and Before Midnight was a unique directorial effort, but Richard Linklater’s latest film Boyhood is even more remarkable. Each year beginning in 2002, the filmmaker and the same cast shot a segment of the film, thereby capturing the childhood and adolescence of protagonist Mason from his elementary-school beginnings through his admission to university. Over the course of 12 years a work developed whose uncommon authenticity surprised and moved audiences at this year’s Berlinale. Young and inexperienced Ellar Coltrane as Mason grows before our eyes from a child into a young man prepared to face life, the characters around him changing and maturing as well – his sister (the director’s daughter Lorelei) and his parents (Patricia Arquette, Ethan Hawke). And the world in which they live changes, too – seen in innovations in technology, literature and art, as well as in shifts in verbal expression and musical tastes – yet all references to the particular present come across naturally, without the audience noting any jumps or shifts in time.

About the film

163 min / Color, DCP

Director Richard Linklater / Screenplay Richard Linklater / Dir. of Photography Lee Daniel, Shane Kelly / Editor Sandra Adair / Producer Richard Linklater, Cathleen Sutherland / Production IFC Productions / Coproduction Detour Filmproduction, Boyhood Inc. / Cast Ellar Coltrane, Lorelei Linklater, Patricia Arquette, Ethan Hawke / Contact CinemArt, a.s., Universal Pictures International / Distributor CinemArt, a.s.

About the director

Richard Linklater (b. 1960, Houston, Texas) left off studies in literature and drama at Sam Houston State University and went to work on a drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico. In 1985 he cofounded the Austin Film Society and began making Super 8 movies of his peers. Slacker (1990) and Dazed and Confused (1993) pushed him to the forefront of the American independent scene. Great acclaim came with the romancer Before Sunrise (1995 – Silver Bear for direction at the Berlin IFF), the first film of a trilogy that also includes Before Sunset (2004) and Before Midnight (2013). His other independent pictures have also drawn attention, including Waking Life (2001) and Bernie (2011), but he has also worked with Hollywood (The Newton Boys, 1998; The School of Rock, 2003; Bad News Bears, 2005). He heads Detour Filmproduction.