By skyforbes The ambitious nature of filming a movie over 12 years with the same cast of characters, is an astounding accomplishment. At its strongest points, the film manages to capture the very real nature of growing up. However in its weakest moments, the film fails to execute emotional depth in its main character Mason Evans Jr.
Mason, despite being the centerpiece of this story, is a rather uninteresting character development from boy to man. He, as a character, feels underdeveloped in his teen years, where he should be the most complex.
That’s not to say this is due to the acting. There were certain areas which I felt Ellar Coltrane knocked the performance out of the park. Such as, when Mason's mother was with the abusive Professor, and Mason was forced to cut his hair. I felt emotionally invested in that situation for many reasons. One being that when I was a kid and was told I needed to cut my hair, I felt as if my say didn’t matter. Mason was stripped of his most basic human right at such a young age and it felt as if no one around him truly cared.
These types of emotional concepts are woven throughout the film that capture the most simple parts of human nature. However, the writing lacked in that departments for this specific character, especially throughout the Teen Age-Young Adult phase. Mason could’ve used this emotional depth and weight to rebel against his parents, then eventually reconcile as he faces a serious life altering experience. Instead once Mason hit his teenage years he became bland and the least complex a character can get. The character goes on a course that leads him to psuedo-philosophical levels. He starts speaking the type of philosophy that the character has not earned.
Lines such as
“I just feel like there are so many things that I could be doing and probably want to be doing that I'm just not.”
~Mason Evans Jr. 2014
point out a major flaw in Mason. He speaks inorganically, he’s clearly coasting through life without conflict, and is drained of authenticity.
Ironically however, there were far more interesting and complex characters surrounding Mason, like his mother Olivia, and father Mason Evans Sr. Both of which clearly face the many consequences, emotional trauma, and growth that a Main Character in a Coming of Age story should. Olivia coming to the realization at the end that life is just a series of moments really struck a beautiful chord. It was one of the core concepts that the film executes very strongly.
In my rewrite I hope to reconstruct the foundation of Mason’s character to further build to his inevitable “come to age”.
So with that being said here is my official ReWrite of…..
Boyhood: “12 Years In the Making”
6 Year Old Mason
In 2002 we meet 6 Year Old Mason Evans. Living with now divorced Mother Olivia and Older Sister Samantha. The opening act revolves around Mason struggling to accept his parent’s divorce. (In this rewrite the divorce is finalized just 6 months prior to the start of the film)
Mason hasn’t seen his father [Mason Evans Sr] since the separation per his mothers wishes. This causes Mason to become depressed. Although at a young age it’s hard to know what depression is we see that Mason struggles to stand up for himself with the local kids who bully Mason for not having a dad around anymore and not being into (what would be perceived to be) manly things like Bike Riding, Baseball, and playing in the woods, etc. Mason usually keeps to himself at the local park. He one day finally Befriends a boy named Michael who gets his drawings ruined by a puddle he dropped them in. Michael is the one person Mason ever seems to like being around when he’s not at home. He develops a love for pictures because of Michaels drawings. Mason asks his mom for a camera so he can take pictures while he’s out playing but his mom refuses saying that it’s a waste of money. Mason sees that his mom gave his sister a new bike helmet and gets upset that she was given something without even asking for it. He decides to steal money to buy a cheap digital camera at the shop. He hides it from his mother who eventually finds out after she runs into the shop owner who brings up that he was excited to use the new camera implying that he thought Olivia bought it for him. Olivia grounds Mason for stealing. Mason runs away and tries to stay at Michael's house but Michael’s Parents find out and tell Mason to call his parents to pick him up. Mason calls his father who after some convincing agrees to come pick Mason up. Mason Sr informs Olivia that he has Mason and will let him stay with him for the weekend and bring him back Sunday night so he can cool off. Mason reconnects with his dad who plays up to the cool single father stereotype and takes Mason Bowling and to the arcade. Mason gets this perception in his eyes that his father is a cool guy and a fun parent who lets Mason do things that his mother wouldn’t. Mason Sr finally sits Mason down and tells him that his mom works hard to keep Mason in school and have food on the table everyday. He says his mom was right to punish him for stealing the money for the camera and wants Mason to help him with a side project to work off the money he stole from her to learn a little responsibility for his actions. Mason and his father fix up an old house.This would be a fun montage scene with Mason Sr showing Mason handy skills that he would be able to use throughout his life if he should run into a situation that called for it. But during this we get a real heart to heart when Mason asks his dad why he and his mother separated and why he never sees him anymore. Mason Sr tells him that it’s not easy being separated because all he wants is to have the family together. He tells Mason that he [Mason Sr] and Olivia had different values in life and their lifestyles caused them to drift apart. Mason Sr gets to live his life the way he wants and Olivia wants to raise the kids so that’s the agreement. But he promises that he’ll try harder to be around more for Mason and Samantha. Upon returning home Mason apologizes to his mother for stealing the money to buy the camera and for running away. He gives the camera to her and heads to his room. We get an interaction between Olivia and Mason Sr for the first time and it’s a bit awkward as Mason Sr just wants to come in for a few minutes to talk and catch up but Olivia is insistent that he goes and thanks him for watching after Mason for the weekend. Mason Sr obliges but before leaving he gives her the money back for the camera. Olivia refuses but he insists saying he made Mason work for it all weekend to pay her back and that she should think of it as Mason paying her back not him. She reluctantly takes it but seems a bit impressed that he actually took responsibility as a parent and taught his son a life lesson.
7-11 Year Old Mason
In 2003 Olivia decides to go back to school now that she’s allowed Mason Sr (who lives the next town over to be closer to the kids) to take the kids a week at a time every so often. This new routine has freed up some time for her to go back to school and get her degree to get a better job. She’s been struggling with her current job as it doesn’t pay well but she manages to get by even refusing to take money from Mason Sr. This is when she meets the professor Bill Welbrock.
In 2004 Mason, sitting in on one of the classes due to his father not being able to watch him that day, sees his mother flirting and even kissing the professor revealing that she’s been seeing him for a few months. Mason is displeased with this and doesn’t know how to handle the situation. He asks Samantha if she knew about it and she says that she thought Mason knew. Samantha doesn’t see a problem with it as they know Bill’s kids from their school and if they get married there would be more people to hang out with all the time and the house wouldn’t be so empty. Mason talks with his mother about this but she tells him that it’s her decision and he should think about how it makes her feel. Mason then throws it back in her face and asks if she ever took a second to ask Mason how he felt about it. She apologizes that she didn’t bring it up to him but wanted to keep it from him because of his father being back in his life and didn’t want to upset him by bringing another man in his life. Mason says that if it makes her happy then he will try and be supportive.
In 2005 Bill and Olivia got married and blended the two families. We get fun scenes of this deceptively happy family. Mason is the only one who is unhappy with this change as he’s beginning to see his father less and less
In 2006 Bill shaved off Mason's hair saying his hair looks like his deadbeat dads. This finally sets Mason off after an altercation between Randy (Bills Son) Randy takes after his fathers assholish ways and Mason seeing a lot of Bill in Randy decides to fight him. Mason and Randy scuffle back and forth. We cut to a flashback scene of Mason at a wrestling match with his dad and afterward where his dad is showing him how to perform the moves. Mason slams Randy to the ground and seriously injures him. This causes Olivia to get extremely upset with him and begin to neglect him more and more.
In 2007 Bill is revealed to have increased his alcoholism. He’s become more violent and abusive over Olivia and the kids. Mason and Samantha one Weekend visit their father and go to a Houston Astros game and have a sleepover at his house where they meet members of his new band (same scene sequence from the original film only a year later to coincide with the timeline).
Upon bringing them home the next day we finally get an interaction between Mason Sr and Bill. Olivia isn’t home to greet the kids as she’s taking a night course for a few months to make up for her absence due to the recent marriage and honeymoon occupying most of her time recently. Mason Sr asks Bill why he cuts Mason's hair forcefully? (this gets brought up between Mason and Mason Sr over their weekend together)
Bill says that it was the way he was raised. He was always told to have short hair and he felt that boys should have shorter hair because it defines their main image of masculinity. It’s the first thing people look at in a man and he doesn’t want Mason to grow up to be looked at as a bum or a failure. This sets off Mason Sr as he gets a bit more hostile towards Bill questioning if that was a dig at him. Bill then says that Olivia left him for a reason then slams the door in his face.One afternoon while Olivia’s out (finding a place to stay to leave Bill) we see the events that unfold between Bill and the kids. Bill sends Randy into a local liquor store to grab booze for him which is successful as the owner of the shop knows Bill and can see him outside the window. Bill then later on at the house strikes Mason after he accidentally breaks the bottle while playing with a ball in the house. Olivia returns home and has called the kids father to come pick them up so she can be alone with Bill for a while. As they’re leaving Mason Sr looks back and sees through the window, Bill hitting Olivia! Mason Sr asks his son how he got the bruise on his cheek and Mason refuses to answer. Mason Sr barges into the house kicking the door in and beats up Bill in front of his kids. Mason tells Olivia to grab hers and the kids' things and get in the car. She obliges and they leave. Mason Sr drops them off at her friend's house who agreed to let them stay with her and Mason Sr tells the kids to head in while he talks to their mother.
Mason Sr and Olivia finally hash things out. Olivia thanks him for saving her and the kids from Bill and he says that he couldn’t sit by and watch that happen to her regardless of the status of their relationship. This in fact changes the relationship between them going forward as she becomes more accepting of his lifestyle and lets him spend family dinners with them to be closer to the kids. They set ground rules as they’re not back together and explain this to the kids so they don’t enter into a false sense of security. We end this portion with Mason and his father out on a camping trip where Mason reveals he’s been developing a thing for girls. This is where his father teaches him another life lesson about women and how to treat them. He says that it’s not easy to find the right person to love but the key is not to look for them and instead just find them.
12 year old Mason
- Mason and Samantha’s bond is becoming stronger as they get older. Mason Sr has a new girlfriend named Ani (short for Anita). Mason and Samantha both like her as she doesn’t try too hard to connect with them on a motherly level and instead as a friend unlike Olivia’s previous relationships. Anita is a Hispanic woman who Mason Sr met during one of his band's gigs. Ani brings the kids to her niece's quinceanera as she wants to show them her lifestyle and culture. This is where we get to meet her parents and her cousin Enrique (yes the same Enrique who was working on the house in the original film which by the way stays the same cause that was an incredible scene that played out to a bigger outcome for Olivia)
Mason and Samantha are shown talking to one another about relationships as Samantha reveals she has a new boyfriend. Mason expresses his struggle with talking to girls and Samantha teaches him how to talk to them and what girls like from her perspective. Mason goes to ask a girl at school named Emma to hang out at the park later but he chickens out after a bunch of her friends come up and ruin the solo moment. We get a back and forth of Samantha teaching Mason different things about girls and what to look out for. Samantha says that if a girl is interested she will find the time to be away from her friends to be with him. This becomes the main thing Mason tries to accomplish. He wants to develop a close relationship with Emma but can never seem to get her alone. Either her friends keep interrupting or other boys keep trying to get Mason away from her so they can talk to her.
One day during gym class Emma hides behind the bleachers and calls Mason over. The two talk for the whole period bonding over a similar interest in music. He shows her his dads band. The two start hanging out more often and Mason even shares his interest in photography with her. We don’t mention his love for photography much until this point because Mason is very secretive of it ever since he got in trouble for stealing the money for the camera. His mother since that time has given back the camera and allowed him to use it again. Mason confides in Emma about his secret spots where he likes to take photos of nature and animals. He even brings her to the spot. Later on we learn Emma has been bringing her friends and other boys from school to this spot to hang out as it is secluded and hardly has people wandering around. Mason one day runs into Emma and the group hanging out there and he gets mad that she brought people to his spot. She doesn’t seem too remorseful about this as she didn’t think it was a big deal. Mason reveals he was going to ask Emma out and she along with the rest of the group starts laughing at him saying that he would never date her in a million years. She only hung out with him because she felt sorry for him. He didn’t have any friends and was desperate to spend time with her. She makes fun of his dads music saying it’s tacky and that she’s not surprised Mason was into the music. She thinks he's as boring and tacky as his father. Mason gets extremely upset and starts to cry but one of the boys shoves Mason to the ground and stomps on his camera shattering it. Mason gets up and punches the boy straight in the jaw knocking him down. The rest of the group cower and run away calling Mason a freak. Mason picks up the pieces of his camera and walks home in despair.Upon returning home Mason yells at Samantha saying she lied to him about girls. He says they’re awful and he never wants to date them. Samantha helps him calm down and tells him that every girl is different and that he went searching for the idealistic girl. He can’t search for the girl he wants….the one he wants will find him. This is an epiphanic experience for Mason as he realizes this is the exact thing his dad said to him. He realizes that he was trying too hard and should really just focus on finding himself and not a girl to fill a void.
Samantha, being a couple years older than him decides to use her age gap to scare Emma and her friends. Samantha and her friends approach the girls at Mason's spot and intimidate them. Samantha and Emma come face to face. Samantha tells Emma that she needs to apologize to Mason because he is a good kid who liked Emma and wanted to cherish her. Emma should be grateful that there are boys out there who look at her like that, given her bad personality. Samantha tells Emma that she never wants to see her or her friends in this spot again or she’ll ruin their lives. (You know the bigger sister thing to do.)
Emma apologizes to Mason and even offers to have his camera fixed but he refuses and tells her that he should’ve just left Emma alone in the first place. He accepts Emma’s apology and says that he hopes she can change and not surround herself with girls who think they’re better than everyone.
Mason now without his camera tries to find other things to fill his free time with. But nothing seems to interest him other than photography. Mason then begins spending more time in his room becoming more and more depressed again.
13 Year Old Mason
It’s 2009 and Mason has officially become a teenager. He’s preparing for High School but can’t seem to bring himself back to a place of happiness since the events of last year. On Masons 13th Birthday he’s given a brand new camera by Samantha who says she saved up her allowance and made money by doing the newspaper route every morning before school to buy it for him. She says she felt guilty about what happened to the old one and doesn’t want to see Mason upset anymore. She makes a remark about how girls in High School find the artsy guys way more attractive anyway. This brings a smile to Mason's face. He finally tries to rely less on the camera and only uses it when he feels inspired. Mason joins a poetry group after school where he meets Sheena. Sheena and Mason are paired up to trade poems and analyze them.
After their poetry meeting one day, Mason and Sheena hangout and begin sharing their poems to each other. Mason’s is about photography being his escape from the real world. Sheena’s talks about liking a boy but isn’t sure if he likes her back. This is obviously about Mason. Mason at first is hesitant to advance with this further after the events with Emma. But he decides that he needs to let himself be happy and he likes spending time with Sheena. So he decides that he wants to spend more time with her and she becomes his first girlfriend.
Sheena and Mason go into High School together as Boyfriend and Girlfriend.We get a few scenes of summer break where Mason and Samantha (who befriends Sheena’s older sister) go camping with Sheena’s family. Mason and Sheena share their first kiss one night by the lake….
14-15 Year Old Mason
In 2010 Mason started High School. He and Sheena are still together and seem to have an extremely strong relationship. Mason spends less time doing Photography only resulting in participating in it as a hobby and a class at school because he wants to spend more time with Sheena.
Samantha and Mason visit their father who’s since been remarried to Anita. They enter a hospital room as they see Anita has given birth to a baby boy named Miguel.
Later in the year they visit Annie’s parents farm for Masons 15th birthday party where he gets the Shotgun and Bible (cause that was a great scene and really brought together the different lifestyles of American/Hispanic people in Texas).It's 2011 and Olivia's new boyfriend is introduced. A military man named Jim. Jim is a strict man given his background with the military.
(A big side note is that he isn’t a drunk like Bill but is verbally abusive. He never lays his hands on Olivia or the kids but does berate them from time to time)Mason one day finally snaps at his mother telling her that she was wrong to bring another abusive man into their lives and should be more like his father who found love with a woman who accepts him and his children. Olivia breaks down crying finally succumbing to the pressure of her children. She apologizes to Mason for being a terrible mother. Mason, feeling guilty reconciles with her and tells her he didn’t mean to make her feel this way. She agrees that she jumped too quickly into another relationship to fill a void and didn’t take the time to think about the kids. She leaves Jim after learning of his deployment deciding that this is the best time to part ways.
16 year old Mason
Mason is now a Junior in High School entering the year 2012. Samantha has been sent off to college where Sheena and Mason go to visit as Mason is thinking about attending the same school after Senior year. They plan to spend the long weekend there.
The week before the trip Mason is approached by his photography teacher who confronts Mason about his grades. He tells Mason they’re not looking great and if he wants to make it college he needs to turn them around. Regardless of how good Mason is at photography (which according to the original film he was extremely talented in the eyes of his professor) he won’t be accepted to any school if he doesnt show promise in all his courses. His professor wants him to take this weekend to focus on himself and his future.
We see the same events play out on the trip with Mason and Sheena having their first sexual experience with one another.
During Christmas time Mason and Sheena break up just days before Winter Break after an argument over Sheena going on a ski trip with other guys involved. Mason asks why he wasn’t invited and she tells him that she didn’t want him wasting time on the trip taking pictures instead of being in the moment. Mason accuses Sheena of not being supportive of his passion. Sheena calls it a stupid passion that will never help Mason in his future. She says she regrets the night at his sister's dorm and regrets reading her poems to him….Mason tells Sheena that one thing he can take away from this is that he loved her poems. But maybe the poems were what made Sheena seem like a compassionate person. The two break up leaving Mason alone for the holidays.
Mason decides to spend the holiday at work (bussing tables at a local restaurant) picking up extra hours to avoid going home and facing his family post break up.
His Mother decides to come to the restaurant as Samantha went to visit their father. Olivia tells Mason that no one will understand the heartbreak more than her. She tells him it’ll happen a million times over before he’s found the right person. It’s something she’s been trying to figure out for years since she left his father. She reveals she’s been lying about her studies at school. She hasn’t been studying business but rather psychology as she plans to be a therapist given her rough past of bad relationships and being a single parent. These experiences changed her views on top of Mason finally facing her and telling her she was making mistakes by immediately running into the arms of men who didn’t deserve her. She says she’s going to be a wreck when Mason has gone to college. This is where we get the big emotional scene from the original film from Olivia. She tells Mason that life is just one moment after another. She thought there would be more. The next moment is sending Mason to school….then it’s her funeral. She tells Mason that she wishes she could go back and fix the mistakes she made. But she can’t and she’s okay with that because when Mason is up there at the vigil. She knows what she will be remembered for. Being a mother who cared about her kids and their passions. Everything she did was for them. She knows Mason has struggled now but it only gets worse from here if he lets it.
Mason tells her that it wasn’t the break up that hurt him. He learned a while ago that girls will come and go and that he can’t paint a picture for his perfect someone. The only thing he knows is that the person who’s right for him will support his dream….That’s what Sheena failed to bring. She put his dream down and that’s what hurt him the most. He tells her he’s felt lost his entire life. The only thing that’s given him a light on his path is the flash on his camera. He thanks his Mother for raising him and not letting his dad leave his life. He thanks her for always recognizing when times called for a change and when life needed to be thrown in his and Samantha’s faces to teach them a greater lesson. He apologizes for not always being supportive of her choices but will always believe in her choices as the best ones.
17 Year Old Mason
In 2013 Mason won a second place silver medal in the state photography competition. He’s awarded an academic scholarship to Sul Ross State University for Photography.
Mason graduates and is thrown a big party where his whole family is present. Mason’s dad gives a speech about watching Mason turn from boy to man before his very eyes and he believes he’s a greater man than he is. We remeet Enrique (now written to be Ani’s cousin who became close with Mason and Samantha through Mason Sr)
and get the same scene as before with only a slight difference. One being that it takes place at the graduation party and the second being that he reminds Olivia about their interaction all those years ago and offers Olivia assistance in starting her personal practice with Psychiatry as he felt moved by her words all those years ago. Without her he wouldn’t have changed his life. He believes it’s the least he could do for helping change his life.
18 Year Old Mason
Mason has moved into college. He parts ways with his father who gives him one last piece of advice about being on his own. He says that loneliness is only possible if Mason shuts out the world. He tells Mason this is a fresh start and that he needs to not let life pass him by.
Mason sits alone in his dorm room and looks at his camera and wonders if he is just an image captured for memory………… The silence is broken by his roommate Dalton and his girlfriend Barb. They tell Mason they’re going out on a hike for a spiritual reawakening before they face the new challenges ahead. Mason decides to tag along and he meets a girl named Nicole whom he begins to spark a new interest with during their journey. Mason ends the film capturing a picture of Nicole staring into the sunny sky looking at her future ahead of her.