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Richard Linklater's remarkable film, Boyhood, lies on the boundary between narrative fiction and documentary. Made over the course of 12 years, Boyhood follows the life of Mason Evans from 6 to 18 as he navigates the possibilities and difficulties of growing up in a divorced family. What sets Boyhood apart from other films is that rather than using a series of actors to portray the different stages in life, Linklater took a leap of faith and drew together a cast with a commitment to gather a few times a year for the next 12 years. Twelve years is a stretch of time, longer than a labor contract can legally be drawn. While Ellar Coltrane, the young boy who Linklater cast as Mason, is handsome and full of presence, there was no way to know who he would become, whether he could carry a film of this magnitude. But the risk Linklater embraced pays off fully. From the perspective of a psychoanalyst, it is a film that delivers a deeply developmental view of character and maturation. Over the course of the film, we have the chance to watch a boy — both the fictional Mason and the actual Ellar — grow up. This merger of the factual and fictional leads to a movie that feels true to its core.
In the first scene, we come across Mason, age six, lying on his back, looking at the clouds. Coldplay's song “Look at the Stars” is playing in the background, and we are drenched in a sense of dream and imaginative possibility. His mother, Olivia (played by Patricia Arquette), comes to get him and he tells her, “I figured out where wasps come from … Well, I think it must be if you flick a rock into the air just right, it'll turn into a wasp.” His mom accepts Mason's magical science saying with some measure of appreciation, “Dang.” But Olivia, a single mother, has her mind more clearly on trying to shepherd her son toward the Real and the assumption of responsibility. They drive toward home and she brings up her meeting with Mason's teacher. The teacher reports that Mason hasn