A Single Man is a movie directed by Tom Ford based on the novel of the same name by Christopher Isherwood. It is told from the point of view of George, (Colin Firth), who is single for a number of reasons. He is single because he is not married and single because he is gay; it has been eight months since the death of his lover, whom he still deeply misses and mourns. He is lonely and emotionally empty; his only real human contact of any consequence is with Charley (Julianne Moore), a sad, middle-aged alcoholic. There had been a time when George had made a half-hearted attempt at an affair with Charley because at the time in which the movie is set, 1962, homosexuality was still a "wink nudge" subject that George rather prefers to mask. The movie begins when George is planning on killing himself. This is where the brilliance of Firth's performance comes into its own. He is emotionless and unreadable, a man whose mask wears a mask. Growing up in Britain in the 1920s and '30s he found nobody with whom he could share his feelings for fear of arrest and imprisonment. Now living in California, he is alone again without his lover, the theme of isolation central to the movie.
Fashion designer Tom Ford makes his directorial debut with this movie and consequently critics leaped on the fact that the film is over-stylized and over-designed, but this actually seems to work in its favor because this is exactly how George's view of himself manifests itself as well. This also throws up the most contradictory element of the film because a man who is as neat and tidy and as given to over-designing his outward appearance as Firth's George will never do anything as disorderly as kill himself.
The film was nominated for over fifty awards (won thirty-six of them) including a nomination for a Best Actor Oscar for Colin Firth, who won Best Actor accolades at the BAFTA awards later the same year.
