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family drama

House of Gucci – Desire Destroys a Family

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“And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and killed him.” (Gen. 4:8 NRSV)

It is worth remembering that humankind’s first murder was a family affair. Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci is the newest way of telling the story of a family that destroys itself because of the greed, ambition, and hubris of its members. Certainly, that concept has fueled storytelling for eons. We think of the TV shows like Dallas and Dynasty, and currently HBO’s Succession. But House of Gucci is “inspired by the true events”. This is a real life version of that age old story.

Adam Driver stars as Maurizio Gucci and Lady Gaga as Patrizia Reggiani in Ridley Scott’s HOUSE OF GUCCI A Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures film Photo credit: Fabio Lovino © 2021 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The film’s center is Patrizia Reggiani (Lady Gaga), a young working-class woman. Her father owns a small trucking company. At a party one night, she meets Maurizio Gucci (Adam Driver), the introverted scion of the fashion dynasty. When she hears his last name, her eyes light up, and we can tell she wants in. She works her way into Maurizio’s life and heart. His father Rudolfo (Jeremy Irons) thinks she’s nothing but a gold digger. He’s not far off, but there is more to it than that. When Rudolfo cuts off Maurizio’s money, Maurizio goes to work for Patrizia’s father until they marry, living a simple working-class life.

But Maurizio’s uncle Aldo (Al Pacino) connects to them, and the lira-sign lights in Patrizia’s eyes go off again. Aldo is the business brains of Gucci. He wants to expand. Rudolfo lives in the past and doesn’t want to change anything. Aldo’s son Paulo (Jered Leto, who steals every scene he’s in) wants to be a designer but is talentless. Aldo calls him an idiot, “but he’s my idiot”. He sees Maurizio as the future of the family business. Between Aldo and Patrizia, plans are made to bring Maurizio into the business. Now the conniving and manipulations can begin. Patrizia seems to always be at the center of it all. It is her ambition that drives the story—and in the process destroys the family.

(l-r.) Jared Leto stars as Paolo Gucci, Florence Andrews as Jenny Gucci, Adam Driver as Maurizio Gucci, Lady Gaga as Patrizia Reggiani and Al Pacino as Aldo Gucci in Ridley Scott’s HOUSE OF GUCCI A Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures film Photo credit: Courtesy of Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures Inc. © 2021 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The story covers the period of the late 70s to the 90s. Along the way we watch as fashion changes. This is a world of extravagance, and Patrizia especially shows it to the world. In time Maurizio will also be drawn into this world of ostentation, just as he’s drawn into Patrizia’s ambition and cunning.

There is an interesting use of music in the film. Some of the time, the music is the popular music of the day. That feeds our nostalgia. But often we hear operatic music driving the scenes. The music reminds us that this is that thrives in the world of tabloids and people’s fascination with the rich and famous, but it is also a story of epic proportions that tells of the elemental mythos of the destructive power of ambition and hubris. That mythos that goes back to the story of Cain and Abel.

Adam Driver stars as Maurizio Gucci and Lady Gaga as Patrizia Reggiani in Ridley Scott’s HOUSE OF GUCCI A Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures film Photo credit: Courtesy of Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures Inc. © 2021 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Watching a movie is always something of a voyeuristic experience. That is especially the case here as we watch the rise and downfall of Patrizia and others. But we should also note that many of the desires that drive and ultimately destroy these characters often live within each of us. As it says in the story of Cain and Abel, “. . . Sin is lurking at the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it.” House of Gucci shows us the dangers in nor mastering our desires.

Al Pacino stars as Aldo Gucci and Mãdãline Ghenea as Sophia Loren in Ridley Scott’s HOUSE OF GUCCI A Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures film Photo credit: Courtesy of Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures Inc. © 2021 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc. All Rights Reserved.

House of Gucci is in wide theatrical release.

Photos courtesy of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures.

Wildland – Family Values?

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In Jeanette Nordahl’s Wildland, family is the most important thing in life. But is that good? Can a source of love also be a place in which one is broken down? Is the call of family worth giving up one’s sense of right and wrong? And what will we sacrifice to belong?

Following the death of her mother in a car accident, seventeen year old Ida (Sandra Guldberg Kampp) is sent to live with her aunt Bodil (Sidse Babett Knudsen) and three older male cousins.  Ida is welcomed but she really hasn’t met any of them for many years. Her mother and aunt were estranged from one another.

Although Bodil welcomes her warmly, her cousins are a bit standoffish. But soon they are taking Ida with them to clubs and when they go to work. It turns out the family are loan sharks. The cousins go to collect debts, and often use violence or the threat of violence in the process. On one such collection call, the violence gets out of hand and there is trouble brewing for the family. Will Ida turn her family in, or will she be willing to sacrifice herself for the family?

One of the interesting parts of the film is watching the family dynamics. We hear words of love and signs of affection, but they often seem to have just a small touch of unspoken threat. The violence that the cousins mete out is a part of the atmosphere at home. Ida for the most part stays in the background and observes. Is she soaking in the culture or trying to distance herself from it?

The film shows the power of the desire to belong and be loved. Ida is alone in the world, except for Bodil and her family. Bodil has learned how to manipulate her sons and is now working on Ida to prepare her for a place in the family. (There are also two other women, a wife and a girlfriend of the sons, plus a grandchild and an expected grandchild that will all be living in this environment.)

There are ways that this film harkens back to other crime families, such as the Corleone family in the Godfather films or the Cody family in Animal Kingdom (which also had a matriarch leader). As in those families, we see the bonds of family being manipulated and abused. Such films show how the concept of family and loyalty can be come corrupted and corrupting. A reminder that the basis of sin is often a virtue that is abused.

Wildland is in limited release and available on virtual cinema.

Photos courtesy of Film Movement.

Hope – The Possibility of Light in the Darkness

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“You don’t have to love me just because I’m dying. But I need to know that you’ll help me.”

A diagnosis of terminal cancer inevitably brings upheaval and stress into any family. Hope, Norway’s official Oscar Submission for Best International Feature Film (it made the shortlist, but wasn’t nominated), is an intimate and intense look at the dynamics within a family, and especially between spouses in such a troubling time.

Anja (Andrea Bræin Hovig) and Tomas (Stellan Skarsgård) have been together for many years. They have three children together as well as three from Tomas’s first marriage. They have built very separate lives through the years, but have managed to stay together (although not married). A few days before Christmas, Anja learns that she has a brain tumor, likely a metastasis from her earlier lung cancer. Such tumors are invariably fatal.

The film follows Anja and her family through a very difficult eleven day period. They try to keep the diagnosis secret through the holiday, but with Anja’s reaction to the steroids she’s been put on, it becomes necessary to reveal the truth. She is struggling with thoughts of mortality, but also with concern for her children, especially her teenage daughter. Tomas and Anja also must deal with questions within their relationship and how their lives have evolved over the years. All the while they must deal with holidays with friends and with various medical appointments to determine any steps to be taken if there is to be any hope of survival.

At the very beginning of the film is a note that says. “This is my story as I remember it.” The film is based on director Maria Sødahl’s experience of getting such a diagnosis. (Obviously, she recovered.) That is what makes the film such an intimate portrayal of a very trying time in her life. As Anja struggles through such tumultuous times, trying to deal with holidays, family, drugs side effects, and the frustrations of even a good medical system, we can see something of the reality Sødahl lived.

The setting of the Christmas/New Year holidays is interesting because those are days we associate with hope—whether it involves Christmas presents or the dawning of a new year. But for Anja and Tomas, much of what they are seeing is hopelessness. Doctor after doctor tells them there is no hope—only short-term remedies.

That makes the film’s title stand out. This is a film in which hope, while it seems so elusive, is central to the characters’ lives. Hope, as it plays out in the film, is not just about a possible medical outcome. It applies to the future of Tomas’s and Anja’s children. But the real focus of hope that we see here is on healing the rift in the relationship between Tomas and Anja that has grown through years of distraction and routine. If they have only a little time left together, will it be a time of love or only struggle?

The film leaves all its questions unresolved, and in so doing it challenges us to consider our own level of hope.

Hope is available in theaters and through virtual cinema.

Photos courtesy of KimStim Films.

Hillbilly Elegy – Family Turmoil

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“Where we come from is who we are, but we choose every day who we become.”

J. D. Vance’s bestselling memoir Hillbilly Elegy has been brought to the screen by Ron Howard. The memoir recounted Vance’s childhood in the Ohio Rust Belt, where he was raised by a mother struggling with addiction and his grandparents who came from rural Appalachia. After spending time in the Marines, Vance went on to college, then Yale Law School. The film carries the story arc, but comes up short on the kind of insight that Vance brought to the book.

HILLBILLY ELEGY: (L to R) Haley Bennett (“Lindsay”), Gabriel Basso (J.D. Vance), Amy Adams (“Bev”). Photo Cr. Lacey Terrell/NETFLIX © 2020

The film focuses on the troubled family relationship. As Vance (played as adult by Gabriel Basso and as a youth by Owen Asztolos) is preparing for interviews for a summer internship at a prestigious law firm (a job he needs to be able to continue law school), he gets a call from his sister that their mother Bev (Amy Adams) is hospitalized because of a heroin overdose. He has to make a long drive from New Haven to Ohio, deal with trying to get his mother in to rehab, then drive back in hopes of making an important meeting.

As the trip plays out, we see flashbacks to his youth. His mother, while loving, constantly battled substance abuse. The more nurturing relationship in his life was his grandmother, Memaw (Glenn Close). Memaw was a no-nonsense woman who embodies the values of hard work and honesty that Vance, in his memoir, associates with the rural Appalachian community. After one of Bev’s breakdowns, J.D. moves in with Memaw, who pushes him to excel in school.

HILLBILLY ELEGY: (L to R) Haley Bennett (“Lindsay”), Glenn Close (“Mamaw”),Owen Asztalos (“Young J.D. Vance”). Photo Cr. Lacey Terrell/NETFLIX © 2020

The film becomes not so much a story of those values as a story about a family struggling with addiction. It becomes about J.D.’s mixed feelings about his love for his family and the struggle to succeed in another world. That was all a part of the book, but the book became such a success because it offered much more.

Films by their nature have a great deal of voyeurism. We are watching other people’s lives from a distance. The same is true of memoirs and novels. In his memoir, Vance took us into the white working-class culture that he grew up in. He does not look down at it. He values it. He shows us the trials, frustrations, and the values that have led to alienation. The voyeurism of the memoir seemed to lessen the distance the reader might have felt in thinking about Appalachia and the working-class. The film boils down to a less helpful voyeurism. We watch a family in its pain, but we are always a bit removed.

HILLBILLY ELEGY: (L to R) Glenn Close (“Mamaw”), Amy Adams (“Bev”). Photo Cr. Lacey Terrell/NETFLIX © 2020

When the book came out in 2016 (a few months before the election of President Trump), it served as a kind of bridge between two segments of our society. Vance has a foot in both worlds. He knows just how easy it is to settle into despair. But he also exemplifies the ability to advance through a strong work ethic. Early in the film we see J.D. panicking at a formal dinner over all the silverware. But we can tell that this is a world that he is growing into. That social and political insight were the strength of the memoir, but is missing from the film.

Hillbilly Elegy is playing in select theaters (where open). It will be available on Netflix on November 24.

For audio of our conversation with Ron Howard, click here.

Photos courtesy of Netflix.

Sorry We Missed You: When the Work Ethic Doesn’t Work

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“I’ve got to go to work. I have not got a choice.”

We are told that if we work hard, we will find success. For many the “gig economy” seems to be the way they can take control of their lives and find the financial success they need. Ken Loach’s film Sorry We Missed You provides a much darker view. What started off as great hope of a brighter future devolves into a world of desperation.

Ricky (Kris Hitchen) has bounced between jobs since the 2008 economic downturn. He had been in construction. As the film opens, he is interviewing for a job as a delivery driver. It seems exactly what he wants. He will be his own boss, he is told. He won’t be paid wages, he’ll get fees. With hard work he can begin to bring home enough money to get his family back in their own home. But to really make money, he’ll need his own van.

His wife Abby (Debbie Honeywood) is a home health aid. She has a car she uses to go from client to client. But to get Ricky a van, they sell her car, making her rely on buses to make her appointments. The two of them put in long hours—12 to 14 hours a day. Meanwhile their children, sixteen year-old Seb (Rhys Stone) and tweener Liza Jane (Katie Proctor) try to get by. Seb is dark and brooding. He cuts school and paints graffiti. He knows how to push Ricky’s buttons—and does so frequently. Liza Jane strives to be a peacemaker in the home, but what a burden that can be.

When problems arise, Ricky discovers that the “self-employment” he thought his job entailed was really an illusion. There is no flexibility. He must be there every day, or arrange for a replacement. Not doing so results in not just lost pay, but a £100/day fine. Abby also has little flexibility, in part because she is compassionate and caring. When she must do extra work, it is not compensated. As the stresses of work and within the family continue to grow and compound on each other, the characters find themselves in a spiral of despair.

The film is set in Newcastle, as was Loach’s previous film I, Daniel Blake (which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes). It is not a sequel, but could well be seen as a companion piece. Both deal with the trials of the working class trying to get by in an economy that doesn’t care about people, but about bottom lines. Whereas I, Daniel Blake deals with the working-class struggle with a good dose of humor and eventually shows the power of the human spirit in midst of a soul-deadening bureaucracy, Sorry We Missed You is much darker and pessimistic. As the hope that drives Ricky to start this new job slowly evaporates, the stresses on everyone in the family may destroy their loving relationships. And the film does not allow us to walk away with a sense that things will get better.

This is meant to be a troubling film. It calls into question some of the foundational beliefs of our society. As we watch Ricky and Abby work long hours in hope of achieving some financial improvement, we discover that the supposed promise of the work ethic is deceptive. They not only fail to gain on their goals, they become deeper and deeper in debt. That debt is not only financial, but also emotional and spiritual. The work ethic that we see in play here does not elevate workers, but erodes their dignity and threatens their humanity.

Note: This film comes with subtitles, even though it is in the English language. The Northern England dialect can be difficult to understand, so the subtitles are very welcome.

Photos courtesy of Zeitgeist Films in Association with Kino Lorber

What They Had – Family Struggle of Dementia

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Dementia can be a nightmare for families. It’s not just watching a loved one becoming lost as their memory deteriorates. It requires making hard choices that can put family members at odds with each other. What They Had is a look inside a family that is struggling to deal with a wife and mother as she slips deeper and deeper into dementia.

After her mother Ruth (Blythe Danner) wanders away on Christmas Eve, Bridget (Hilary Swank) gets a call from her brother Nick (Michael Shannon) to come home to Chicago to help deal with the problem. Nick, who still lives near his parents has seen Ruth’s ongoing decline. He has been involved in her care. Nick is adamant that the time has come for Ruth to be moved into “memory care”. Her husband Bert (Robert Forster) wants nothing to do with moving her from their home. He will take care of her, he says.

Michael Shannon stars as “Nick”, Taissa Farmiga as “Emma”, Hilary Swank as “Bridget” and Robert Forster as “Bert” in Elizabeth Chomko’s WHAT THEY HAD, a Bleecker Street release. Credit: Bleecker Street

When Bridget arrives, she becomes the referee between father and son. She tries to find middle ground, but it may not be possible. Nick has everything planned, but it is Bridget who holds power of attorney. As the family struggles over how to deal with Ruth, other side issues naturally arise to both illuminate and complicate things: the hostility in Nick and Bert’s difficult relationship, Bridget’s loneliness within her marriage, and Bridget’s lack of understanding her own daughter Emma (Taissa Farmiga).

But this is also a story of a family in which love is real. Even though Bert spends a great deal of time trying to tell his children that there are no bells and whistles in love, he and Ruth clearly had a relationship that was held together by a deep, romantic relationship. And that relationship is central to understanding why Bert is so adamant about keeping Ruth with him. Even in the midst of fighting, the family maintains its bonds between each other. Bridget and Nick have their own sibling resentments, but still we know they want the best for each other and for the family as a whole.

Blythe Danner (left) stars as “Ruth” and Robert Forster (right) stars as “Bert” in Elizabeth Chomko’s WHAT THEY HAD, a Bleecker Street release.

I found this to be the most accurate portrayal of dementia and its attendant issues of any I’ve seen on film. (At least, it very accurately mirrored my experience with my mother sliding into dementia.) Writer/director Elizabeth Chomko based the story on her grandmother’s descent into Alzheimer’s disease. It is at times filled with pathos, and at other times quite humorous, just as is the case with watching someone you love who has dementia.

And while our family did not have as dramatic confrontations as this family, we did have differences of opinion about what would be right at any particular time. It is the family struggle that is the real focus of What They Had, rather than dementia itself. In this too Chomko brings an eye and ear for reality. She also uses the other difficulties in her character’s lives to bring out the emotional and sometimes spiritual struggle the family undergoes. An example is a set of scenes with mother and daughter in bed together, one with Ruth and Bridget and one with Bridget and Emma. Without words, these two shots give us a visual reference to what is going on in Bridget’s life.

Blythe Danner and Hilary Swank star as Ruth and Bridget Keller in WHAT THEY HAD, a Bleecker Street release. Photo courtesy of Bleecker Street

What They Had offers us a chance to see that love and pain often travel together. This family suffers as Ruth loses her memories. But they are also bound by a love that continues through the pain and even the anger it dredges up. This is often the reality not only in dealing with dementia, but also with the many other trials that life brings our way.

 

Back to Burgundy – Finding Family Again

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“When I was little, every morning I’d look out the window, and I’d think, ‘Every morning it changes.’

“Yeah, when I was a kid I thought every day was different, and it would always be like that. It would always keep changing. But then I realized that, here, nothing ever changes.”

The dynamic of change and lack of change is explored in the family drama Back to Burgundy (French title: Ce Qui Nous Lie, ‘What Binds Us”). It is the story of the reunion of three siblings on their family’s vineyard. There is much that is the same as it has always been, but also much that changes day by day.

Oldest son Jean (Pio Marmaï), whose thoughts open this review, left home years ago to see the world. When he learns his father is dying, he returns home when his sister Juliette (Ana Girardot) now runs their vineyards. Their brother Jérémie (Françoise Civil) has married into one of the premiere winemaking families in the area. Naturally, this is a time of both joy and turmoil. There is love between these people, but there are also resentments that have grown through the years of Jean’s absence.

After their father’s death the three must figure out what to do with the family’s estate, given the large tax bill they are facing. As they work together through the year-round vineyard activities, they must negotiate not only the business aspects, but more importantly their relationships must go through much of the same kinds of changes that the vineyards face.

The film makes great use of the Burgundy countryside and the various aspects of winemaking. We see the vineyards through various seasons. We watch as the siblings taste grapes and debate which day will be the best for harvest, and later what grapes to combine into the wine. But all this visual celebration of wine also serves as a metaphor of the relationship the siblings must reestablish. As the film says at one point, “Love is like wine. It needs time. It needs to ferment.”

As the three siblings (and later Jean’s wife and son) interact, they slowly come to find peace with both their pasts and the present. For that to happen, they must recognize the parts of themselves and their relationships that are immutable, and also to discover the newness that can come each day—just as Jean noticed as a child looking out his window.

Photos courtesy of Music Box Films

What Will People Say – Culture Clash

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What Will People Say was one of my favorite films at AFIFest this year. I wasn’t alone in my estimation of the work; it also won the Audience Award in the New Auteurs section. It is a powerful and engaging film in which two different value systems collide within the life of a teenager as she grows up with connection to two cultures.

Sixteen year old Nisha (Maria Mozhdah) is the dutiful daughter of Pakistani immigrants to Norway. Her family observes the ways of her homeland, and participates in the broader Pakistani community. But having grown up in the European culture, she is also a very normal Norwegian teenager. Her friends are Norwegian. She sneaks in and out of her bedroom window at night. One night her father discovers her boyfriend in her bedroom. He beats the boy. Police are called, and Nisha is taken into a shelter while she and her family try to deal with the situation.

Her father and brother then kidnap her and take her to Pakistan to live with family there and better learn the traditional values. She struggles to fit into this culture that she really doesn’t understand. She begins to adapt, but soon her teenage behavior causes shame to her Pakistani family which forces them to call her father to come get her. She is caught in the midst of trying to fit into cultural ideals that she really doesn’t understand or accept. But this is her family. These are people who love her and have raised her. But how can they tolerate behavior that goes against all they have ever known? And how can she adapt to such a world when she has been raised in a western ethos?

I’m sure it makes a difference that I’m watching this with western eyes. (And that it is made with a western perspective.) But even though the Pakistani ethos may seem harsh from our perspective, it is treated with the respect that it deserves. When Nisha’s parents worry about how others will think of them as a result of Nisha’s actions, it is because honor is so important in their culture. Even after years of living in Norway, her mother is embarrassed when her husband makes her dance with him with friends present in their home. Such mores are hard to escape. And in fact, because of what Nisha has done, the family is being ostracized by other Pakistanis. And even though they are hurt and angry, Nisha’s parents continue to strive to do what they feel is best for Nisha and her future. The connection between Nisha and her father is front and center in showing the loving, yet often hostile relationship.

The conflict arises when the western value of individual freedom (especially as it plays out in adolescence) is added to the mix. Nisha has been raised within this culture as well as her family’s culture. This is her natural environment. And in reality, part of the reason for her parents coming to Europe was for such freedom and the opportunity it provides for their children. It is not only Nisha who is conflicted over these values. Her father also has this struggle. But the gap between her first generation father and 1.5 generation Nisha gives each a different perspective.

The real question posed by the film is if these two different value structures—each valid within their cultures—can coexist. Is it possible for Nisha to live the life her parents want for her and the life that she has been told can be hers from the European culture? And if she must choose, what will the cost be? This is an issued faced by many immigrants from various cultures as then adapt to new homelands. It can also be a concern for families in any culture when there are changing value systems—and let’s face it, the world and its values are constantly shifting. Parents of each generation struggle to teach children the values they were raised with that may now seem passé.

It is hard to imagine an ending that is satisfactory for all involved, and the film doesn’t find one. Rather it sets in motion even more questions of how these lives will play out in a changing world. Perhaps freedom is not an ultimate good, any more than honor is. Yet both are worthy values to cultivate in people and in society.

 

Lady Bird – Discovering a Best Self

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“I wish I could live through something.”

The senior year of high school, the cusp of adulthood, is the setting for Lady Bird, the coming-of-age comic drama from writer/director Greta Gerwig. Christine “Lady Bird” McPherson (Saoirse Rowan) is at that point where she is not satisfied with her life. Her hometown of Sacramento seems to be the epitome of nowhere. Her family, which is struggling financially, is somewhat embarrassing to her. Even her image of herself isn’t what she wants it to be, and so she has chosen her own name.

Lady Bird’s senior year (2002-3) is almost a holding pattern for her desire to leave and live the kind of life she believes exists in other places. She wants to go to New York for college, even though her grades are mediocre and her family can’t afford much. Along the way there is experimentation with acting, boyfriends. There is typical teenage heartbreak. But mostly there is conflict with her mother, Marion (Laurie Metcalf).

Marion is very pragmatic. She hunts for bargains. She works two shifts. She tries to push Lady Bird out of her own self-absorption. There are times she and Lady Bird bond as mothers and daughters often do, but they also irritate and repel each other as mothers and daughters often do. Marion often seems hard or angry, but she is always loving. Lady Bird only senses the animosity, leading her at one point to say “I wish that you liked me.” But she fails to see just how much Marion and Lady Bird’s father (Tracy Letts) do for her. Lady Bird is often cruel in her relationship with her mother. Never in big ways, but she tends to wound with a thousand small cuts.

There is a great sense of reality to this relationship, in not small part because of the reality of the characters. Ronan’s portrayal of Lady Bird is not about a great teenage angst, just the day-to-day struggle to understand who she is and wants to be. Metcalf’s Marion is not a saccharine best friend or a dominating harridan. She is struggling with her own understandings of Lady Bird and her desires for Lady Bird’s future.

There is also a spiritual dimension to Lady Bird’s story. Because she attends a Catholic high school (although apparently not Catholic herself), there are scenes that take place in religious services, and priests and nuns play roles in her life and growth. The religious aspect is always treated with respect. The religious characters are just as human as everyone else in the story. The most prominent is Sister Sarah Joan (Lois Smith), the school’s principal who provides a touch of grace in nearly every scene she is in.  And although Lady Bird may not seem to be outwardly religious, the environment that the church has provided through her time at school, provides her with a place to re-center herself when she discovers life away from home is not as different as she had hoped.

This is one of those films that has me wanting to go back to Ecclesiastes. Certainly Lady Bird thinks “There is nothing new under the Sun” (at least in Sacramento). She is busy looking for meaning and happiness in wealth, or sex, or fame, as did Qoheleth. And like Ecclesiastes the discoveries of meaning are found within.

I saw this film on Thanksgiving weekend, and it was amazingly appropriate. So much of our time is spent being oblivious to the many things we have because we so often focus on the things we do not have. That is very much Lady Bird’s experience with the world. Sacrament seems to her to be a place to escape from, even though when she wrote an essay about it, Sister Sarah Joan says it shows she loves this place. She sees her family as an embarrassment, but also a place of love. She thinks she has never really experienced any thing of import, but each little thing adds up to a life time. Which brings us to the quote I use to open this review. It is one of the first lines in the film. By the end, we know (and Lady Bird is discovering) that she has been living through a great deal. That is an important first step in appreciating the world and the people around us.

Photos courtesy of A24.

Summer 1993 – A Child’s Loss of Innocence

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As Summer 1993 opens, children are playing in the street. One of them looks at six-year-old Frida (Laia Artegas), and asks, “Why aren’t you crying?” Is that part of the game or does Frida have reason to cry? As viewers we don’t yet know why she should cry, but when we find out we may spend much of the film wondering that ourselves.

It is the story of a young girl whose parents have died of AIDS. She is being uprooted from her home in Barcelona to live with an aunt, uncle, and younger cousin in the Catalonian countryside. It is a drastic change in her life. Her family is loving and supportive, but this is not yet her home. In some ways she is a pawn in the family tensions between her religious grandmother and her parent’s generation that has moved away from the church. But even though her family loves her, she frequently presses the limits of acceptable behavior—perhaps acting out what is going on inside her.

The generational divide over religion is one of the forces at work within Frida. Her grandmother encourages her to say the Lord’s Prayer daily and to pray to her mother who is watching over her. But as time passes, she senses that her mother is increasingly absent. Frida faces not just the grief of losing a parent, but is having to deal with the first inkling that the faith her grandparents taught her will not sustain her.

The film is based on writer-director Carla Simón’s own childhood. It is a series of vignettes, as memory often is, but there is a structure that allows us to see Frida’s struggle to come to grips with the grief within her, as well as the new family and cultural world she is in.

The rural setting makes for a beautiful backdrop that emphasizes Frida’s innocence. The sunny and seemingly carefree setting also is a contrast to the pain that Frida holds within.

This is a child’s story of a summer that marks a transition from one life to another. The depth of her loss has not really taken hold. Realizing the reality and finality of death is one of those moments when innocence is chipped away. There are moments of fun, but in much of the film Frida seems quite impassive, as if she refuses to let the emotions within her find the surface. The summer is the setting in which Frida must grow to find her new life and come to grips with the past.

Summer 1993 is Spain’s official submission for Oscar consideration.

Photos courtesy of Oscilloscope Laboratories