Because the great majority of English-speaking movies are tailored to a one-size-fits-all mindset, it’s surprising to find “The Mother” so uncompromising. It denies us glib reassurances. It says people soldier on without the world eagerly embracing them all of the time. Or even much at all. Anne Reid perceptively plays May, who seems to be in her 60s. She has an air of long-suffering wife about her. Though not mean, she’s casually impatient with husband Toots (Peter Vaughan), who is 80ish. When they arrive too early for a visit at the London home of their prosperous son Bobby (Steven Mackintosh), his wife, Helen (Anna Wilson Jones), and two bratty children, we sense that the older couple is a little too eager to escape the boredom of home. Bobby seems pleasant enough, but he’s less interested in indulging his parents than in taking calls and in the home improvements being handled by best friend-carpenter Darren (Daniel Craig). May’s divorced daughter Paula (Cathryn Bradshaw), who has a child, too, teaches a writing seminar but is making little headway on her own novel. When Toots suffers a fatal coronary, May is stunned. “If I sit down, I’ll never get up again,” she says. Toots may not have been much of a companion of late, but without him she’s lost. She returns to her own home but cannot bear the solitude. “I’m not ready for old age,” she says. The void propels her back to London, to the chagrin of her offspring. Paula, at least, needs a sitter, but she takes every opportunity to chastise May for depriving her of encouragement and confidence. May is stunned to discover that Paula’s lover is Darren, who, after all, has a wife and an autistic child Paula is trying to coerce him into leaving. The shrill Paula inadvertently makes May’s injudicious interest in Darren comparatively sympathetic. May and Darren share common interests, especially Paula and Bobby, over a lunch by the Thames and a stroll through a cemetery. And then more. “I thought that nobody would ever touch me again, apart from the undertaker,” says May, full of renewal but trotting like a lamb toward a precipice. Only May and the egocentric Paula achieve much focus in “The Mother,” but they’re sufficient for screenwriter Hanif Kureishi (“My Beautiful Laundrette”) to impart a sense of desperation in lives lived alone and without appreciation. Neediness can generate demeaning behavior. Director Roger Michell (“Notting Hill,” “Changing Lanes”) paces “The Mother” deliberately. He focuses on objects that define scenes. Characters pause regularly to catch up with what’s happening to them. You want to intervene and help them break the cycle. But Darren, though not fully inhabited by Craig, is to be read as a life force who has the social skills to attract but who is dangerously unreliable and devoted to self-interest. Consider the older target audience for “The Mother,” and you may agree the filmmakers err in including so much crude language and such graphic sexual images. Wishing May some relief from her anxiety is not the same as wanting to violate her privacy. Additional Information:

Details

‘The Mother’ Director: Roger Michell. Stars: Anne Reid, Daniel Craig, Cathryn Bradshaw. MPAA rating: R, for sexual content including graphic scenes of sexuality. Opens Friday: Squirrel Hill Theater.

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