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Little actually happens in "A Single Man," fashion designer Tom Ford's debut film about a gay British expatriate living in Santa Monica in 1962. And yet everything happens in one day in the life of George Falconer (Colin Firth): grief, love, remembrance, work and fear.

Jim (Matthew Goode), George's longtime lover, has been killed in an accident, and George sees little reason to continue living. But he goes through the motions, teaching at the college where he works, visiting his best friend, Charley (Julianne Moore), letting himself be pursued by a student, Kenny (Nicholas Hoult), who wants to confide in him, and perhaps more.

Much of the film is shot in close-ups, and Colin Firth, restrained and seemingly cool, betrays passion in subtle ways. The shots of his face when he hears the news of his lover's death, via telephone, should be a lesson in battened-down shock and grief for any acting student. Eduard Grau's cinematography is sensual without being explicit, and Polish-born Abel Korzeniowski's musical score -- lots of strings, some piano -- is lush but not overpowering.

Being a "single man" -- or, as George's neighbor puts it, "light in his loafers" -- in 1962, the era of bouffant hairdos and the Cuban missile crisis, was a very different matter than it is today, at least in Santa Monica. Ford's script, from a novel by Christopher Isherwood, captures not only the pain, both hidden and overt, of one gay man, but also some of the repressive spirit of the time just before the sexual revolution changed everything.

In two respects "A Single Man" is untrue to its subject. No college professor could afford to live in a gorgeous, modern glass-and-wood house like George's; and, even in 1962, he would never go to work in beautifully tailored suits and highly polished shoes.

Rated R for nudity, some disturbing images and sexual content. 1 hour, 39 minutes.

— Renata Polt

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