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November 2009 Penguin Readers' Noticeboard
The film of An Education opened in the UK at the end of October to great reviews
'My life might have turned out differently if I had just said No'. Lynn Barbers's wickedly funny memoir has been adapted into a screenplay by author Nick Hornby, and it promises to delight and amuse.
'A very unsentimental education it was, too. Nick Hornby has adroitly adapted and given a dramatic shape to the bestselling memoir by Lynn Barber, telling the true story of how, in the early 1960s, she was seduced as a 16-year-old schoolgirl by an older man. This sociopathic charmer's seduction crucially extended to her poor old mum and dad, dazzling them into being complicit in the arrangement; along with their daughter, they went into a clenched denial about what was happening. Hornby's screenplay of An Education, catches the stranger-than-fiction absurdity nicely, and, although he softens the most excruciating moment from Barber's book, his script gives the audience a clear view of the painful delusions of all concerned. There is a wonderful performance from 24-year-old newcomer Carey Mulligan as Lynn – here renamed Jenny – the heartbreakingly vulnerable pseudo-sophisticate earnestly cramming for her Oxbridge exams, and longing for real experience. Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian, 29th October 2009
Go to the The Guardian website to read the full review.
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