Director Joanna Hogg
THE SOUVENIR B+
Great Britain USA
(119 mi) 2019 d: Joanna Hogg Official
site
When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet:
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.
―Song, by Christina Rossetti from Goblin Market and Other Poems, 1862,
though written in 1848 as a teenager
As dismal and
depressing as film gets, which is a courageous statement to make as an artist,
but this one makes you want to jump off a bridge and end it all, where it’s
relentlessly downbeat until the final shot, actually more of a roller coaster
to hell. If you stick through the end
credits, it reveals this is the first of two parts, so there’s more of this to
sit through. That said, the film is
superbly acted and directed, and while autobiographical of the writer/director,
based on her real-life experiences while attending film school in London in the
early 1980’s, it creates a captivating visual and emotional landscape all its
own, not feeling like other films, basically discovering new ground while
exploring the horrid effects of a toxic relationship. The director gets inside the wounded soul of
a young woman who is enchanted by first love, even after she realizes the
devastating effects, with viewers cringing with horror at her choice not to
pull away, remaining a true partner, steadfast and loyal, even while her partner
wastes away the best years of his life, poisoning what’s left of their love,
yet the director is somehow able to remain detached from it all and allow
cinematographer David Raedecker to simply observe with an artistic eye as a
woman from the upper crust of British society refuses to let go of what she
believes is the best thing that ever happened to her. Charming and naïve, she may be, yet she’s no
fool, initially flabbergasted to discover purely by accident that her partner
is a “habitual drug user,” ignoring the marks on his arm, unable to even
conceive such a doomed path, as her whole life is ahead of her, yet they engage
in a kind of sordid Sid and Nancy
affair for the privileged upper class, clearly able to separate reality and
illusion, but the reality that exists for her is just an illusion for her
damaged partner. The two players are
remarkable, Honor Swinton Byrne (daughter of Tilda Swinton, who plays her
mother in the film as well) in her breakout role as Julie, a shy but ambitious
film student from the upper crust, and Tom Burke as Anthony, at least a decade
older, who supposedly works in the Foreign Office, appearing suave and
sophisticated, highly educated, showing a cultural appreciation, yet behind the
spit and polish is smug arrogance and pathetic manipulation, where he pretends
to be understanding but he’s a user, growing darker and more desperate by the
day and by the hour, eventually succumbing to his disease, dying from an
overdose, which is how the film ends, just as she’s finding her voice as a
student filmmaker, where the final sequence of shots is utterly enthralling,
staring straight at the camera, challenging viewers to put themselves in her
place, asking how would they fare?
Winner of the World
Cinema Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, the director’s working style is of
interest, as everyone was given a script except the two leading players who
were instead each given artifacts from the 80’s, diaries, photographs, old
letters, even the first Super 8 footage she ever shot, and then told to
improvise. Shot in chronological order,
in this way the lead actors discover their circumstances for the first time
before the camera, adding a more naturalistic style which the director was
looking for in what is essentially a reconstruction of her own personal
memories. Hogg and Tilda Swinton have
known each other since the age of ten, so she is familiar with the
circumstances of the relationship, though curiously in the film Julie hides the
darker side of her relationship from her mother who nonetheless stands by her
daughter. One of the more remarkable
scenes is a walk together in the vast rural countryside where Swinton’s own
dogs are allowed to run free, scampering ahead of the slower human walkers,
relishing the unbridled freedom they’ve been given. The stark contrast between this open,
expansive image and the claustrophobic, closed-in interior world of the couple
couldn’t be more pronounced, as one is sprinting ahead with no encumbrances
while the other appears to be sleepwalking.
The title actually comes from an 18th century painting by Jean-Honoré
Fragonard
(The Souvenir by Jean-Honoré Fragonard – my daily art display), a depiction
of young love, romanticized in a dreamlike reverie, showing a girl carving
initials into a tree while a letter from her lover lies on the ground, where
nothing else matters, as this is all that exists in the world at that
particular moment. As if spawned in
innocence, this film begins much the same way, meeting an older gentleman at a
party, more distinguished than the riff-raff she meets at film school, Julie is
seen pitching her idea for a film before the older faculty members who are
struck by the idea of making a film about something that is so foreign to her,
insisting upon a story with a working class background, something she clearly
knows absolutely nothing about, showing black and white photos she has taken of
the economic wasteland and neighborhood ruin, revealing the harsh deprivation
of the times, claiming she doesn’t wish to remain in a “bubble” forever
pidgeonholed to stereotypes. While this
may leave them scratching their heads, she’s quickly given more practical
advice, “The most important thing is that you make a connection between your
experience and the thing you’re trying to film.” While hardly a rebel in any sense, she
resists all patronizing judgment and stakes out her own path, though utterly
lacking in confidence, completely self-conscious about her life of privilege,
wondering how she’ll fit in, avoiding the other students for the most part,
caught up in a torrid affair that exhausts her time and depletes her energy.
Other than the
jarring musical selections, there are few indicators that we’re living in the
80’s, yet Julie’s sympathetic view of ordinary people comes from caring for the
forgotten, her personal reaction to the Thatcher era, with IRA car bombs making
the headlines, blasting to smithereens any idea that peace in Northern Ireland
is near, suggesting troubled times exist, which includes a bomb that rocks the
neighborhood, unsettling the normal calm, where she has the luxury of safety
and protection, with key moments happening offscreen, living an isolated life
with a troubled man that has quickly moved in with her. Told with a dreamy sensibility, essential
storylines are omitted, like Julie confronting Anthony about his addiction, and
large chunks of time pass without notice, yet the central focus of Julie’s life
remains unscathed, somehow able to balance her boyfriend’s deterioration and
instability with normalcy, retaining a sense of purpose through school, even as
she scraps her plans of a working class drama and changes course in midstream,
trying something different, though visibly awkward and clumsy on the set,
unable to assert herself or express authority, yet films are made in just such
chaotic and disorganized circumstances, where it seems a miracle that something
lucid and coherent could come from that confusion. Through a series of lies, stolen money, and a
fake burglary, there remains an air of refinement, as they continue to visit
such posh restaurants, including a visit to Venice that begins in tears of
shame and horror, yet through sheer persistence and weeks of planning, she
manages to wear a long flowing gown and visit the opera in high style, with
operatic excerpts interspersed throughout the film recounting the underlying
tragic elements of it all. Anthony is a
despicable soul that sucks her blood like a vampire while poisoning his own,
yet she patiently stands by him, leaving viewers aghast at her willingness to
submit to his loathsome behavior, enduring detestable insults and abuse with
passive acceptance, continually begging forgiveness by kissing his hand, a
gesture made infamous in THE GODFATHER (1972).
What this does is expose her vulnerability, making that the centerpiece
of the film, with all the decorative aristocratic scenery feeding into the
vague inexpressiveness of her inarticulate character. Basically a coming-of-age story, it’s only
behind the scenes that she gains confidence and grows, always looking rushed
and insecure making phone calls home on a wall phone in between shots on the
set, but once that door closes and shooting begins, another personality is
emerging, which only comes to light after the death of Anthony, shooting a
scene with an actress openly negotiating the terms of death, reading the lines
of the familiar Christina Rossetti poem (a reference to Tilda Swinton appearing
in her unfinished student film entitled The
Rehearsal), as somewhere, behind a slow tracking shot of people assembled
on the set, behind them all is Julie, suddenly staring straight at us, now
emboldened, taking on a new attitude, with the feeling that the door to her
future has somehow swung wide open.
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