An Education

During an office coffee klatch, a question came up: "When did you first realize you were smarter than your parents?" It's a curious question that assumes all people aspire to eclipse their parents and worse, crow about it. The thing is, strip away that cocky posturing and you're likely to find an inexperienced and unworldly person.

An Education is a smart film based on the memoir of Lynn Barber and adapted for the screen by Nick Hornby. Set in the suburbs of London in the small window of time at the onset of the 1960's-- post war but pre-fabulous mod fashion and rock n' roll, the story follows a 16 year old whose life is transformed by her romance with an older man.

Jenny, an ambitious teenager who aspires to attend Oxford University to appease her well meaning parents, also dreams of living in Paris, speaking French and absorbing all the culture imbued in foreign films, decadent paintings and country holidays. She meets the much older David, who drives a sports car, takes her to posh restaurants and nightclubs and instructs her in the means of the good life as well as the most effective way to lie to her family and teachers. The pace and exhilaration of her transformation from drab student to stylish Lolita is purposely unsettling. If something seems too good to be true...well, you know how that goes.

Hornby, whose work is always interesting, is especially gifted at defining characters through convincing language. In his universe, shy, awkward teenagers, ruffled parents, seductive Lotharios and worried schoolmarms express rage, lust, dismay and fear without ever losing their cool. Of course, great writing relies on the talent of a stellar cast, like the entire ensemble of An Education, notably Carey Mulligan who plays Jenny with intelligence and grace.

Mark Twain wrote, "When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years." An Education illustrates impetuous youth; when faced with everything, how little we know.