A MUCH-NEEDED EDUCATION

"An Education" is a rare gem of a film. Catch it if you can! Directed by Lone Scherfig, a Danish woman who also helmed the highly engaging "Italian for Beginners," it is rightfully generating Oscar buzz, but too few people are seeking it out. Starring Carey Mulligan, Peter Sarsgaard, Alfred Molina and Olivia Williams (Dollhouse), it is based on a memoir by Lynn Barber, with a screenplay by Nick Hornby ("About a Boy").

Not only did I thoroughly love the movie, but, after viewing it, I felt as if I'd just emerged from a great battle. When I left the darkened theatre, I was exhausted, scarred, exhilarated, terrified and grateful to be alive. How vital to be able to experience something so piercingly truthful, at a time when such truths are virtually extinct, but more needed than ever.

The action takes place in the early 1960's. Jenny (Carey Mulligan), a 16 year-old girl from a working class family in London, is being primed by her family to go to Oxford. Her life is tedious, but safely ordered -- she seems to be marching inexorably toward the goal. She gets straight A's in English (and, we assume, in most of the other subjects). She dutifully plays the cello in the orchestra, not because she's passionate about music, but because her father (Alfred Molina) believes it will weigh favorably on her application.

At first glance, it appears as if Jenny's parents, in wishing their daughter so highly educated, are ahead of their time. But, in the course of the film, we discover that they are very much with the times, after all. They aren't interested in encouraging Jenny to fulfill her highest potential, but rather to help Jenny find a husband from a potentially higher class.

Into our protagonist's dull, predictable routine appears the dashing stranger, (Peter Sarsgaard) more than twice her age, driving a flashy car. Little by little, he charms his way into the girl's heart and her parents' as well -- their sheltered, narrow existence and their enormous ambitions for their daughter make them extremely gullible and easily deceived. They unexpectedly find themselves allowing Jenny to go to concerts at venues just across town, places that they have never dared to explore. They extend her curfew (it's educational!) and even permit Jenny to visit Oxford overnight, with little but the word of this honey-tongued interloper to suggest that their daughter will be safe.

What transpires is predictable, but the heroine's transformation is not. At first, she is dazzled and delighted by the music, the art she recognizes from her studies and is now encouraged to bid for at auctions, the fancy restaurants and fine wine. When the smoke clears, she becomes aware that all is not as it seems, but she can't pull herself away and return to her former life. She starts burning bridges. Her grades slip. She is rude to her beloved English teacher (Olivia Williams) and the headmistress (Emma Thompson). Because of the mores of the era, when the headmistress learns that Jenny has been "indiscreet" with an older man (running off to Paris with him for the weekend, for example), she is forbidden from finishing her school term. The dream of Oxford is smashed to smithereens.

Or is it? In a pivotal scene, Jenny is still hooked by the promise of a flashier life, but more aware of its pitfalls (thievery, quasi-prostitution, gallivanting with a woman in her new life who is dumber than a doornail and aspires to nothing). Confused, but still defiant, Jenny shows up at school desperately seeking answers from the only two adult women she knows who have careers and university degrees. Are the hard work, struggle and sacrifice worthwhile? And why does everyone seem so unfulfilled?

The headmistress is ignorant, narrow-minded and anti-Semitic to boot. She plainly tells Jenny that, short of teaching, the only positions open to her are with the civil service. Her English teacher complains about the pony essays she must contend with. Other than voicing her disapproval of Jenny's choices, she is silent. She offers Jenny no life preserver to latch onto. And she was Jenny's best bet.

The other women surrounding Jenny fare far worse. Her mother, a proper housewife, hints at a life before marriage, but since then rarely speaks. Then, there is the mother with a young son 'round the corner whose philandering husband cheats on her with underage girls, Jenny being the latest of these.

Fortunately, Jenny's affair ends before she is saddled with an unwanted pregnancy. Jenny is smart enough to seek help persistently, until the right person -- her English teacher -- is able to offer it. Once again, Jenny's eyes are opened. Instead of the insipid life Jenny has imagined, her teacher's existence is more than adequate -- an apartment of her own furnished with intriguing items from the teacher's sojourns, economic independence, freedom, the life of the mind. With her help, Jenny does eventually enter Oxford, less innocent than she was, but infinitely wiser.

And the script? In a virutally flawless viewing experience, I do have one complaint. Jenny's mother and English teacher should have been more fully developed and given a greater voice. I wanted to know more about their past lives and what had led them toward their current paths. The mother is unduly silent. What had she done before she met her husband? What regrets does she have, if any? She seems to be sleep-walking through life, matching her timidity to that of her husband, who admits his life has been greatly diminished by his fearfulness. What does she think of the opportunities her daughter has that were denied to her? What does she think when all of these come crashing to a halt, partly because she and her husband turned a blind eye?

I wanted to know much more about the English teacher as well. Why has she never married? Does she feel she would have been forced to give up too much? Is she a lesbian? Who are her friends? What does she do on her off-hours? Why doesn't she help Jenny the first time Jenny approaches her?

Like "Revolutionary Road," this movie admirably portrays the stranglehold of sexism on women's lives, 40 years ago. Unfortunately, women (and men) are not yet free of all of these constraints, in the present. If "An Education" makes it easier for us to see the myriad ways in which this blight continues to affect us, it might also contribute to our creative and determined efforts to transform it and ourselves. Perhaps, the much-needed education is offered not only to the characters in the film, but to its audience, as well.