'The Age of Adaline'

For when the vibe is intimate, saccharine, and ruminant.

'The Age of Adaline' -- Promotional Poster

This movie is just delightful. The premise is that a young mother and widow (played serenely by the obviously gorgeous Blake Lively) gets into an accident where she should have died but is kept alive and ageless by a set of crazy, random (scientifically dubious) circumstances. She has spent over a century living a quiet life, wrapped up in gorgeous vintage clothes that I would kill for, trying not to fall in love with gorgeous, intelligent men. The lush color palate and dreamy score of the film convey this little cloud of a story along as it touched on themes of love, loss, and the passage of time. Even the weightier scenes (like when the eponymous Adaline’s beloved dog dies) are cushioned by the fairy tale quality of the script and filming.

Although this is maybe my favorite thing Blake Lively has done (and I REALLY enjoyed 'Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants' when I was a girl), my favorite part of the move is undoubtably Harrison Ford. I have been passively in love with Harrison Ford since I was six or seven years old, obsessively rewatching my 'Indiana Jones' DVD box set. His performance as Dr. Jones (and I do mean tweedy, bespectacled Dr. Jones, not whip-toting Indy) has always fascinated me. I’m more than a little convinced that it subliminally inspired many of my life choices.

But that’s a different conversation. The matured, aged Ford’s turn as the sensitive, dreamy (and I do mean head-in-the-clouds here, not ‘dreamboat’) astronomer adds an expected, but surprisingly layered sentimentality to the film. The monologue he delivers to his wife in one of the final scenes should make us all wish for a love that sturdy and devoted.

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