The Late, Great Amy Winehouse once sung that “love is a losing game,” and no truer words have been sung since Love has its ways of biting you in the ass after what may seem to be years of greatness and gushiness. The constant about love is that you can’t choose whom to love (usually). When something natural comes about, there are little to no ways to fighting it – frankly, why bother? Regardless of your situation, which may be the traditional magnanimous relationship, there can be one person to come around and completely screw that up (unless things were already screwed) for the better. That is the case when it comes to Carol, as it looks into the lives of two women whom became lovers amongst their own independent situations. Love is about taking a leap of faith into another person and hoping they catch you with open arms, and more often than not, it works out, so shoot your shot, kids.

The setting of this movie predates (decades) the aforementioned piece of advice, so they had a different way of saying “go for it,” and thus Cate Blanchett & Rooney Mara show off how important it is (and at times reckless) to really go with your own feelings to ensure your happiness, which is what I find a lot of people not exactly comfortable doing these days. They tend to find more than one reason as to why they can’t like the person, but then you never know you could be missing out on someone because one personality trait or one genetic characteristic isn’t up to par, but this isn’t a rant, it’s a review. This movie also showed the continued theme of opposites attracting each other, because where you have Therese (Rooney), whom is more shy & meek, and Carol – the confident, bold and strikingly beautiful woman in the room, they find common ground for their love, which wouldn’t often happen, but then again, no one is out of anyone’s league. The heart knows above all what it wants.

Movies that are heavy in dialogue and have a slower pace (or ‘talkies’) usually go one of two ways. They can be incredulously boring or they can be flat out interesting. I thought that this would be boring, but it turns out that the direction and the storyline which was elegantly detailed in a feel good type of way with its own struggles, kept me intrigued as it went along. Rooney Mara is a young actress who is already proving that she’s going to be in the game for a long time, because she’s so diverse with her roles. How can one go from The Social Network, to The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, to Side Effects, and now Carol that has Oscar implications? She’s really talented, and it shows in almost every movie that she appears in. Cate Blanchett has already been established in the acting world, but it still feels as though she’s underrated, and I don’t know how (I mean, she’s only won 2 Oscars, but whatever). There’s a good story here that makes you root for the ladies in their quest for their own happiness between them while dealing with trying to escape their problems that they have to face with their respective men (we’re not that bad are we?). As I said, movies like this can be an acquired taste, but it’s a good movie for a date or if you feel like waiting for it on Netflix, that can be done too. It has a ‘classic’ appeal to it, but that’s for time to be the judge. But for now, this is my opinion, this is my review

That’s My Word & It STiXX