As it opened in the United States on July 18, trade journal Variety said plainly that Linklater deserves an Academy Award for the nearly three-hour film.

 

In an unprecedented² filmmaking process, the US director depicts³（描述） the formative years of his main protagonist⁴（主角） and his family using the same actors, shot over 12 years.

 

"Even though it's only July, it's hard to imagine watching a better-made movie in 2014 than Boyhood," said Variety, noting: "No other film has ever been made this way."

 

From 2002 until 2013, the actors met in secret each year to shoot the movie, which follows an average middle-class family in the southern state of Texas.

 

Mason Jr, the eldest⁵ child of Olivia and Mason - played by Patricia Arquette and Ethan Hawke - draws the filmgoer（影迷） into a story that mixes fact and fiction.

 

"I was very excited about it, about the idea of watching the life cycle of a boy growing up like that," says Arquette, whose character becomes a single mom and fights for her children against all odds⁶.

 

Linklater is known for his obsession⁷ with time. It is at the heart of his acclaimed⁸ trilogy about a couple over the decades: Before Sunrise (1994), Before Sunset (2004) and Before Midnight (2013).

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