There is clearly more to "Young Adam" than I am getting. The title, for example. No one in the movie is named Adam, so it
must be symbolic. Used in that sense, "Adam" usually refers to the world's first man, an unspoiled creature who lived a life of ease and splendor in the Garden of Eden before he screwed up and got evicted. But the protagonist in "Young Adam," Joe, is a fairly wicked person, devoid of scruples and morality -- if anything, he's the "old" Adam, the one who HAS been corrupted by the flesh. Maybe the "young" implies that he's not perfect YET, that God is still working on him. Adam in the garden was fully grown when God put him there, after all. Maybe in his youth, somewhere in the mists of heaven, God workshopped him, getting him ready for the big-time. Maybe he was every bit the scoundrel that Joe is. But this is all speculation. What's certain is that "Young Adam" is repetitive and drawn-out. Its first 45 minutes or so seem to promise interesting things to come, but its last hour does not deliver. We realize all that will occur is more of what we've already seen. Joe is an itinerant Scottish laborer who has found work aboard a barge run by Les Gault (Peter Mullan) and his wife Ella (Tilda Swinton). Played dourly by Ewan McGregor, Joe is the sort of man who sleeps with every woman he meets, if he cares to, and he usually cares to. Ella, perhaps sensing this and seeking to thwart him, behaves coldly, but the affair happens nonetheless.
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