Lone Scherfig’s fine film ‘An Education’ is one of the best films to come out of Britain this year. Scherfig’s film features Nick Hornby’s screen adaptation of the memoirs of British journalist Lyn Barber.

For the film Lyn becomes Jenny, a precocious girl on the cusp of her 17th birthday, in a career making performance by Carey Mulligan. Jenny’s story is that she is a bright girl who comes from a working class family and is in the penultimate year of her schooling. All her energies are being devoted in doing well in her final exams with the aim of getting into Oxford University. That is until one day Jenny is befriended by David, a very charming and much older man, played by Peter Sarsgaard. David leads Jenny astray, spending lavishly on her and showing her a lifestyle that she couldn’t possibly imagine. Jenny takes her eyes off the ball, and her prospective Oxford education is in peril. Has Jenny squandered her potentially brilliant future or is David the love of her life, and they will live happily ever after?!

Danish director Scherfig’s production eloquently brings Jenny’s bittersweet journey towards maturity alive. Jenny’s teacher, Miss Stubbs, puts Jenny on the spot when she asks her, ‘You can do anything Jenny, you’re clever and pretty. Is your boyfriend interested in the clever Jenny?’ Carey Mulligan is sensational as Jenny. The film’s last shot of her, as she, perched on the family staircase, pensively looks across at her parents, a shot brilliantly captured by cinematographer John de Borman, is a great movie moment.

Jenny’s life until David had been dominated by her parents, her hard working, conservative father, Jack, wonderfully played by Aldred Molina, and her dutiful housewife mother Marjorie well played by Cara Seymour.

Olivia Williams plays her tough, but caring teacher Miss Stubbs and Emma Thompson is her harsh headmistress.

Peter Sarsgaard is great as the caddish, unbalanced David who drives Jenny’s life right to the edge. Dominic Cooper and Rosamund Pike play David’s best friends, the glamorous couple, Danny and Helen, who adopt Jenny as their young party mate.

Highly recommended, Scherfig’s ‘An Education’ is playing across the main arthouse cinemas in Sydney.