[yasr_overall_rating]
“Correspondence” focuses on the relationship between an astronomer and his lover, who spend their years apart.
Sometimes a movie comes along that completely catches you off guard. For me, “Correspondence” is that film. At the outset, it appears like a straightforward love story, Ed Phoerum (Jeremy Irons), is an astrophysics professor who has been having an affair with Amy Ryan (Olga Kurylenko), a young woman whom he met at one of his seminars. The two fell in love and have been together for six years. Then, one day, Amy is attending a conference that he is scheduled to lecture at but the crowd is informed by the faculty that Ed died a few days prior in his hometown of Edinburgh. Perplexed, Amy leaves, immediately trying to contact him but with no luck. She then proceeds to receive texts, e-mails, and video messages from him, prompting her to think she is losing her mind.
At the most basic level, that is this story’s premise. When we first meet Ed and Amy, they are kissing each other in a hotel room, the same room they’ve been meeting at over the past six years. Ed leaves sweet little messages for Amy every chance he gets, including cards and the aforementioned texts, e-mails, and video messages. After his supposed death, she continues to receive correspondence from him, much to her bewilderment. She travels to Edinburgh and discovers that he really did pass away, due to an illness which he hid from her and from his family. Once in Edinburgh though, she is informed to go to Ed’s attorney where she receives a package from him. When she gets home, the contents include a disc which upon playing it, Ed apologizes to her for not informing her of his illness as he didn’t want to upset her.
As time goes by, she continues to receive e-mails and texts from him, correspondence which she just happens to receive at times when she is missing him most and later she discovers from Ed’s attorney, that Ed had instructed him to send them at a time and date of his choosing but because he had encrypted the e-mails, not even his attorney knew of their content.
“Correspondence” deals with two people who know, after their first encounter, deep down inside, that they were always meant to be together, the fact that Ed already had a family when he met Amy, never really comes into the equation as we are told very little about them. Maybe they weren’t in love anymore, maybe they drifted apart over the years, the answer is never given as this is not a morality tale, but a love story. The movie does not condone Ed’s behavior but it also never explains it either, just that he and Amy are in love with each other.
There are also supernatural elements thrown in, and we are led to believe that because they were soulmates, that he is actually watching over her from the afterlife, and when he sees her hurting, or going through a difficult time, he is able to communicate with her the only way he knows how. The remainder of the story follows Amy and her life as a stuntwoman, constantly diving into her work, at times, coming close to death herself, maybe subconsciously, hoping that her work will consume her, literally, so that she will stop hurting and finally be with Ed forever.
Strangely, two plot elements in the film actually correlate directly to my life. We are told that Ed and Amy first met each other on Sunday, January 18th, 2009, the exact date I met my wife Sherrie, and that Ed’s birthday is April 9th, again, the exact same date of my birthday. Coincidence? Obviously, but still, while watching the movie, it most certainly made me sit up straight and take notice. I am a sucker for love stories and while “Correspondence” doesn’t particularly follow conventional guidelines in terms of visual structure and storytelling narrative, it does keep you glued to the screen as you want to know what happens next. I thought Olga Kurylenko was criminally underused as a Bond girl in 2009’s “Quantum of Solace” but here, she actually steals the show, and the screen, from cinema legend Jeremy Irons. Granted, he is more of a plot device, a means for moving the story forward but Ms. Kurylenko is a wonder as the heartbroken Amy. Throughout the film, she experiences almost every emotion one would go through, given her circumstance, and achieves each and every one of them with great aplomb.
“Correspondence” clocks in at almost two hours and at times it feels much longer, but if you can wait it out, the finale and performances are most certainly worth it.
Now available on Digital HD & DVD
