Simon Carr: Tears when the boys are back with memories

Simon Carr has been through a lot.

In 1994, his wife Susie died from cancer. Suddenly this political writer was thrust into an entirely new relationship with his two sons (one from an earlier marriage) as all three struggled to cope with the reality of losing mother, lover, wife and the living glue that bonded the family together.

Stumbling shell-shocked through this shattering rupture, Carr had to contend with how to handle two young boys in the absence of any female influence. He did so by inventing a new form

of parenting.

He called it "free range" and opted for a "Just say yes" mentality that plunged his life and those of his kids into anarchy.

But it was better than wallowing in misery. Fifteen years later, and nine years after he published his memoir The Boys are Back, Carr is faced with watching that part of his life play out on screen. It is not a pleasant experience.

"It's a very shocking thing," he says. "When you see a film, you see your intimacies being put up on the screen. You feel other people looking at you. That is very gruelling. If I write another memoir, I shall be very careful to leave a lot of it out.

"The net effect of it is that (the filmmakers] have looked into my brain.

"They have left out the less pleasant parts but it's been a triumphant representation."

The process began after Carr's unique style of parenting had succeeded sufficiently for his youngest, five-year-old Alexander, to survive his mother's early death and prosper. He grew up to study at university as did his his half-brother, Hugo, who was 12 at the time of his mother's death.

Carr first wrote a 15,000 word article for Talk magazine which turned into a book proposal. That became a book and then

the film.

Carr is pleased that he is being portrayed on screen by Clive Owen. "I'm glad it wasn't Johnny Vegas. It would have been a very different film!" he says, adding, "I don't question Clive's commitment to the role but he did refuse to put on the four stone necessary to make a realistic representation of me."

I ask whether the process of writing the book, and seeing the resultant film version, was in any way cathartic.

So many writers in similar circumstances talk openly of the freedom they found in putting their emotions on paper. Carr hesitates.

"I honestly don't know if it was a cathartic thing. How it started was that I started writing down everything

that Alexander used to say when he was five, six, seven and eight.

"The reason I did that was that the things that children say are so peculiar that you can't remember them. They're so unconnected with our normal syntax. They're evanescent; they disappear the following day.

"I had a remarkable amount of material but it only came together when I had this quasi-philosophical thought of pitching this for a column. I said to editors, 'The difference between fathers and mothers is that fathers don't care about their children as much as mothers do. It's not that we don't

care at all, it's just that we care less.'

"The incomprehension I got from saying that to people made me want to construct an argument looking back over my life as how I'd done it. I thought I came out of the book pretty well, actually.

"I'm not sure I came out of the film as well as that. The film may, in a funny way, be more honest than the book."

Carr's honesty in the book is matched by the enthusiasm of the filmmakers to tell a true-ish story.

Director Scott Hicks, known for his David Helfgott biopic Shine, adopted much of Carr's raison d'etre in portraying the chaos of the household.

The boys played football in the house. They rode on the bonnet of dad's car. They jumped from the window sill into the bath.

Whatever they wanted, Carr agreed to.

"Seeing the film reminds me of a wild party which was terrifically good fun at the time but things that did seem funny aren't necessarily a source of great pride when seen in the cold light of day," muses Carr. "I still don't feel ashamed about it but I do feel a little bit embarrassed sometimes that they could have had a better start in life with more care, attention and close work.

"But you have to be true to yourself. That's all you can do: be yourself as benignly and generously as possible.

"Children today are over-protected. The cotton wool thing has gone to absurd lengths.

"A certain amount of recklessness is necessary – for boys, certainly. I would absolutely do it again. The free-range upbringing for children is vanishingly rare these days."

The Boys are Back (12A) is on nationwide release.