Ali & Ava

Writer/director Clio Barnard

director on the set

ALI & AVA               B+                                                                                                          Great Britain  (95 mi)  2021  ‘Scope  d: Clio Barnard

What would happen if you took melodrama as a genre and applied it to a social-realist version of Bradford that’s based on real people?  It’s an opportunity to think about what it means to be part of a community.  There’s a lot of kindness, generosity and support in Bradford and I wanted to see that writ large on the big screen.                                                                            —Writer/director Clio Barnard

An exquisitely made film that comes at you from unexpected places, becoming a film for our times, an update on the Rainer Werner Fassbinder film ALI:  FEAR EATS THE SOUL (1974), which was itself a reworking of the Douglas Sirk melodrama, All That Heaven Allows (1955), filmed only ten miles from where the writer/director grew up in Bradford, which has been the setting in three of her four feature films to date, like 2011 Top Ten Films of the Year #4 The Arbor (2011) and Barnard’s equally great 2014 Top Ten List #6 The Selfish Giant, while all four of her films have been set in Yorkshire County.  In those films, what Barnard does extremely well is showcase marginalization in the town of Bradford, people living on the fringes of society, poetically expressing how ordinary lives can be extraordinary.  This may be her most accessible work, featuring an unconventional working class interracial romance from two character actors who rarely get the chance to perform in lead roles, British-Pakistani-Kenyan actor Adeel Akhtar, who has mostly been seen on television, and Claire Rushbrook, who got her start working with Mike Leigh in Secrets and Lies (1996,) also playing opposite Samantha Morton in Carine Adler’s vastly underseen UNDER THE SKIN (1997), her one and only feature, where it’s important to say these two actors perfectly embody the unique characters they inhabit.  This is a surprisingly offbeat film that dares to explore cultural differences through an unlikely middle-age romance, yet what really stands out is the abstract, impressionistic style of the director, taking pages from the Lynne Ramsay and Andrea Arnold social realist playbook, yet making it unique to her own aesthetic, creating an emotionally deep portrait of life in Bradford, West Yorkshire, inspired by two people that Barnard met while she was making earlier films, Moey Hassan, a Bradford actor (who appears briefly in the film), landlord, and DJ who worked with her on THE ARBOR, while a few years later she met Rio, a teacher’s assistant at a school in Bradford who walked out of an abusive relationship during the making of THE SELFISH GIANT, with additional support from script consultant and Bradford-based writer Kamal Kaan.

Music is the beating heart of the film, like an unseen character, described by the director as a “social realist musical,” as profoundly memorable as the personalities who embrace it, as it’s something that links these two people together, beautifully integrating their distinctly different internalized worlds.  Ali (Adeel Akhtar) is a likeable Pakistani landlord, a former DJ who is into punk and rap, exuberant music you can dance to, like the Buzzcocks, Sylan Esso, and Lunar C, while Ava (Claire Rushbrook) is a caring and exceedingly sensitive teacher’s assistant, a widowed Irish mother and grandmother who, much to his dismay, is more into country music and traditional folk ballads, like American outlaw country singer Sammi Smith and Irish singer Karan Casey.  Both Ireland and Pakistan are two countries that were part of the former British Empire, each carrying a legacy of violence and racism, yet part of the melting pot of post-industrial Bradford, which once drew migrant workers from around the world, playing an important part in the early history of the Labour Party, but now facing serious economic and social challenges.  Bradford is a culturally diverse city that has an uncomfortable history of racism, especially in the 70’s, which were marked by hateful demonstrations and attacks, also known for the Brontë sisters who were born on the outskirts.  Both coming from troubled situations and different worlds, yet living in the same town, Ali lives with his recently separated wife Runa (Ellora Torchia) in a working class immigrant neighborhood of rowhouses, while Ava lives in the predominately white housing estate of Holme Wood, leaving her door open to an extended family that frequently come to visit.  What brings them together is their mutual affection for an extremely shy 6-year old girl, Sofia (Ariana Bodorová), a child from Slovak tenants living in a building that Ali manages, who also has language difficulties at school, so hangs out on her own at the playground for the most part. 

In contrast to the rampant crime in the North of England depicted in THE RED RIDING TRILOGY (2009), or the working class dramas of Ken Loach, Barnard offers a compassionate perspective on Northern life, its people and their daily lives, as Ali is introduced in a dense fog standing on the roof of his car and violently headbanging to a high-energy rap track to let off steam, I Know (MAROT Remix) YouTube (4:28), while Ava is seen on a bus lost in thought to the quieter lyrics of Sammi Smith, Saunders Ferry Lane~Sammi Smith YouTube (3:16), each from their own different worlds.  As fate would have it, Ali and Ava are brought together outside the school in a driving rainstorm, with Ali offering Ava a ride home after dropping off Sofia, sharing a moment with the Buzzcocks on the car radio, Boredom YouTube (2:54), only to be pelted by rocks from belligerent neighborhood kids at Holme Wood, who simply have nothing better to do, Ali & Ava - Car Stoning YouTube (1:57), with Ali winning them over by upping the volume on his radio to music of local neighborhood rapper MC Innes, like the lure of the Pied Piper, turning into an instantaneous little dance party in his car.  The next time they meet, they jump around on a set of sofas in Ava’s living room and create their own little party, Ali & Ava - Official Clip #1 YouTube (1:51), yet they’re each listening to distinctly different musical tracks on headphones, creating a kind of kaleidoscopic mix of jubilation and confusion.  If you sense this is not your standard kitchen sink British miserablism that we’re used to, you’d be correct, as this is more celebratory and life affirming.  While there are certainly downbeat subjects woven into the storyline, with moments of profound sadness, loss, and grief, they are countered by more jubilant moments that simply recognize a joy in living, and what a comfort it is to be sharing it with someone you love. 

Premiering at Director’s Fortnight at Cannes in 2021, not much was known about this overlooked film, which seems to have fallen through the cracks and been forgotten, but this is a world class director who makes emotional powerhouse films, and this is no exception, reportedly exuding a quiet presence on the set, often deferring to the actors, realizing the importance of not knowing everything and having an openness to not knowing.  The two lead performances are remarkably nuanced, very well paired together, though they are nothing alike, other than the fact both are intrinsically linked to their respective communities, knowing their neighbors while actively helping them out, like the familiarity of Ali rolling down the car window in his neighborhood to ask who died at a passing funeral, where everyone knows everyone else, both showing signs of extreme generosity, where it’s not told in a conventional manner, as moments appear out of time, giving experimental touches that simply expand the depth and complexity of the film.  What’s particularly impressive are the Ozu-like transitional cityscape shots, like fireworks against a darkened sky, a glowing moon hovering overhead, a moody atmospheric glimpse of early morning twilight, or slowed down pauses that feel like still shots, as they accentuate moments of reflection.  Undercliffe Cemetery overlooks Bradford and is a special place for Ali and Ava to meet.  Occasionally, Sofia has a tendency to climb up the monkey bars, but gets stuck, unable to climb back down without assistance, with Ava offering her reassurance and support, but reminds her that if you’re brave enough to climb up, you must be brave enough to climb back down, which may as well be a theme for the film, which continually keeps viewers off balance even through the end credits, as there is a constant stream of surprises that greatly enhances the overall viewing experience.   

One of the most distinctive voices in British cinema, Barnard’s interest in film started at the age of 14 when she watched Mick Jagger in Nicolas Roeg’s Performance (1970), an acid trip of a movie.  It was on TV late at night, and she viewed it on a black-and-white portable in her bedroom with the volume turned down.  What amazed her was its ability to mess with her head.  “Here’s this real rock star pretending to be one, whose sort-of girlfriend is also in the film in this crazy threesome.  There was something about the real and the fictional that was really fascinating.  It blew my tiny mind.”  What’s most astonishing is how this film subverts expectations in a modern interracial romance that counters the fearmongering of toxic politicians, where there's a tenderness within, finding beauty in the most volatile moments through a beautifully shot character study about two lonely misfits who find emotional comfort and support in each other despite their past traumas and having to deal with community expectations, as they are a catalyst for change in each other’s lives.  There are shocking turns of darkness that come out of nowhere, taking us through intensely personalized avenues of racial abuse and domestic violence, as each respective family quickly disassociates themselves from this new love interest, finding fault in their character when it’s really about race, growing perilously ugly and even dangerous when Ava’s grown son Callum (Shaun Thomas, one of the local kids in THE SELFISH GIANT) pulls a samurai sword on Ali, believing his recently deceased father would roll over in his grave, as he was a member of the National Front (UK).  Ava’s Irish Republican father, who was fiercely proud of his heritage, deeply despised the British and disowned her for marrying an Englishman, a man Callum still idolizes, despite his history of abuse, causing plenty of friction.  Similarly, Ali’s sister calls Ava a “gori chav,” which basically means white trash, coming from a more traditional-minded family that has been kept in the dark about his imminent separation that he’s too ashamed to acknowledge, still living together with Runa but in different bedrooms, having shared an unspeakable trauma that they simply never recovered from. 

It’s an unlikely culture-clash romance in a blue collar city, where the social realist style is beautifully mixed with a steady stream of lyrical musical passages that express what they’re feeling underneath, with Barnard adding her own experimental stylistic flourishes that elevate what we’re seeing onscreen, yet what’s apparent is that the joy of music is an act of resistance, exquisitely shot on ‘Scope by Ole Bratt Birkeland, who also shot her first film.  It’s all about the power of healing, where there’s no right or wrong way, but you know it when you feel it, where there’s actually a laying-on-the-hands sequence, ALI & AVA Clip | TIFF 2021 YouTube (37 seconds), as a shared love of music allows them to heal and transform one another through ordinary acts of kindness.  Familiar Bradford locations include the massive Waterstones bookstore, Undercliffe Cemetery, Bradford Cathedral grounds, Cow and Calf rocks on the Ilkley Moor, and the Keighley and Worth Railway, yet it’s the inner journey that stands out, expressed through British rap, Skwolla | Lunar C YouTube (4:41), American electro-pop, Sylvan Esso - Radio (Music Video) YouTube (3:34), a raw and earthy bootleg Bob Dylan recording, Mama, You Been On My Mind (Studio Outtake - 1964) YouTube (2:55), which curiously has a crossover effect on both characters, and British pub music by Ewan MacColl expressed through a drunken mother and son duo, Ali & Ava - Official Clip #2 YouTube (53 seconds).  Yet what’s most remarkable, and may be the most impactive part of the film, is the final credits sequence, a gift that keeps giving, moving from the thumping EDM music, Daniel Avery - Drone Logic (Official Video) YouTube (5:15), to a heart-rending traditional Irish ballad from Karan Casey, Grace (From Ali & Ava) YouTube (5:29), a searing version of a social justice love song that has a similar effect as the cathartic final scene from John Huston’s The Dead (1987), finding that emotional core that leaves audiences utterly transfixed, having been thoroughly transformed by the experience. 

Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench

 

Writer/director Damien Chazelle

Chazelle with musical composer Justin Hurwitz

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

GUY AND MADELINE ON A PARK BENCH                 B-                                                     USA  (82 mi)  2009  d: Damien Chazelle

I believe the musical is so well suited to expressing romance because songs begin and end and are completely separate from the larger movie world.  It is this kind of momentary perfection of existence that the characters are able to reach, but they always know that it is inherently an illusion.  So for me, there is something very beautiful but yet very sad about the great musicals, but that’s part of the point.                                                                                                   —Damien Chazelle interview, November 13, 2010, Black Sheep Reviews [Joseph Belanger] 

This rather raw and crudely edited early student film remains largely unseen, made on a shoestring budget, Chazelle’s senior thesis project was made with classmate Justin Hurwitz at Harvard, written, directed, shot, co-edited and co-produced by Chazelle, a song-and-dance social realist musical with vérité roots in the French New Wave, shot in various Boston locations in gritty handheld black and white on 16mm, featuring original songs by Hurwitz recorded by the 90-piece Bratislava Symphony Orchestra, Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench (Original Movie Score), scoring all his later films as well.  Much like the Léos Carax film Boy Meets Girl (1984), this is a modern take on the irrepressibility of romanticism that so often leads to the impossibility of love, with diverse cinematic references that are all over the map, exhibiting more of an experimental style, capturing the spirit of the stripped down, free-form style of John Cassavetes’ Shadows (1959), exploring similar themes of interracial romance half a century later, yet the kicker comes when a character breaks out into song in the most unexpected places.  A much more sophisticated version of this stylistic technique is Christophe Honoré’s DANS PARIS (2006), the first of his films where out of the blue one of his characters will break into song, complimented by original music written by Alex Beaupain, followed by several more musicals, including LOVE SONGS (2007), exploring the dynamics of a three-way relationship, La Belle Personne (The Beautiful Person) (2008), exuding in the pent-up passion of a Sirkian youth melodrama, and Beloved (Les Bien-Aimés) (2011), a real treat being able to see Catherine Deneuve work with her daughter Chiara Mastroianni.  Honoré’s films tend to leave audiences sharply divided, and his use of songs as an extension of the narrative is no exception, as he doesn’t accompany songs with traditional dance numbers, or a lively choreographed sequence, but instead delves into the downbeat psychological mindset of the character, often submerged in anguish, lost love, or grief, where musical numbers are used in the exact opposite manner of one’s usual association, which is happy and upbeat, such as Jacques Demy’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg) (1964), which just happens to be Chazelle’s all-time favorite film (Damien Chazelle names his favourite film of all time), as the entitled characters in this movie are borrowed from that film.  Demy is a great admirer of the Golden Age of MGM Hollywood musicals, where his films are basically a love letter to the Hollywood movies of the 40’s and 50’s, incorporating the dreamy music of Michel Legrand and bleak elements of poetic realism into his bursting kaleidoscope of colors that vibrantly come alive onscreen through movement and dance.  Demy is famous for making the black and white Lola (1961) with Anouk Aimée, described by Demy as a “musical without music,” stripped down to only one musical number, while also making the colorful musical explosion, The Young Girls of Rochefort (Les demoiselles de Rochefort) (1967), featuring the adorable sisters, blond Catherine Deneuve and her red-haired older sister Françoise Dorléac, where the line between euphoria and melancholia is a thin one, subject to change by random encounters or a sudden change of heart, where missed connections are built into the storyline, like ships passing in the night, calling into question certain aspects of fate.  Introducing a lost love theme that Chazelle would revisit in his later works, this film explores the protagonist’s inability to balance his musical aspirations with his love life, the same subject of 2016 Top Ten List #10 La La Land, while at the same time musical passages initially heard here would magically reappear in that film. 

Chazelle was born in Rhode Island to a French father and Canadian mother, both college professors, spending part of his childhood in Paris, with dual French-American citizenship, where his first love was becoming a jazz drummer, actually making an appearance in the film instructing the female lead protagonist on the correct way to hold drumsticks, Damien Chazelle Cameo in Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench (HD) YouTube (1:23).  While the comparison to Cassavetes might seem apt, the difference is how essential building character was for Cassavetes, even with non-professionals, as his love and admiration for the craft of acting was an essential component of his naturalistic film aesthetic.  That’s largely what’s missing here, as viewers never really establish an emotional bond or connection to what we’re seeing onscreen, as the characters appear more haphazard or random, disassociated from any central dramatic emphasis.  This is a crucial distinction, something rectified in his breakout hit Whiplash (2014), which was all about establishing character, featuring an exceptional performance from journeyman J.K. Simmons, who simply inhabits the role, rising to public prominence immediately afterwards, where now he’s one of the more recognizable faces in the industry.  But this low fidelity film is comprised with non-professionals, starring Jason Palmer as Guy, a real-life jazz trumpeter who tours, records, and teaches at the Berklee College of Music, and Desirée J. Garcia as Madeline in her one and only screen appearance, simultaneously writing her doctoral thesis on musicals before publishing a book in 2014, The Migration of Musical Film: From Ethnic Margins to American Mainstream, and then in 2021, The Movie Musical (Quick Takes: Movies and Popular Culture), currently a film professor at Dartmouth.  In the first few minutes they are seen together on a park bench before he casually gets up and walks away, without any explanation, as the initial spark has gone out of their relationship and an ennui has set in, as neither one seems to really care anymore, spending most of the film in the company of others in what is essentially a breakup movie.  As they drift apart, we see their separate lives, as Guy plays in a small jazz combo in a dingy basement club setting, feeling very claustrophobic, allowing the music to fill the constricted space which almost feels suffocating, yet there’s also the social release of mingling with friends and well-wishers, as the camera lingers over clusters of loud conversations, never really getting the gist of what anyone is saying, yet the energy fills the air, having an alienating effect on viewers, who feel like perennial outsiders, never actually invited in.  Madeline, on the other hand, feels lost as she wanders alone through the park, like a stranger in a strange land, where she can sit and read, or simply watch others passing by, yet what’s emphasized is that she has no real connection to anything around her, as she’s simply a passenger in an unwritten story.  Alienated and isolated in the midst of a beautiful summer day, audiences are floored when she spontaneously breaks out into song, a clearly dubbed voice blending into the passing crowd near the Old North Church, downbeat and sad, a cheerless comment on her directionless life, yet the theatrical stylization mixes together an unadorned realism with a dreamy façade of artifice, Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench - Before there was La La Land... (Clip) YouTube (2:10).  Leaving Guy behind, she briefly moves in with an older French jazz singer, Bernard Chazelle (singing in French), giving the filmmaker a unique opportunity to direct his own father.  What’s missing in this film is an actual script, feeling more like a series of random vignettes drowning in existential angst, as much of this is told aimlessly, yet the abrupt shifts of a constantly changing point of view never seem to have any real focus, leaving viewers adrift, though perhaps that is the intention.

Perhaps the biggest surprise is the introduction of a new character whose name is not even in the title yet she dominates a majority of the screen time, Elena (Sandha Khin), initially seen watching a juggler performance, actually trying to pick him up afterwards, curiously providing her own name before correcting it.  She feels more like the emotional center of the picture, exhibiting far greater range of expression, where her outgoing nature is really on display when she’s seen meeting Guy purely by chance on a jam-packed commuter train, both standing, holding the grab handles, eventually coming right next to one another, as they do this mysteriously erotic, wordless dance of starting apart, inching ever closer, seeing only the movement of their feet as they begin to face each other, slowly making eye contact and brushing against each other before finally touching affectionately, ending up sleeping together in Guy’s apartment.  While her bubbly personality gives this film a jolt of adrenaline, the same thing happens in this relationship as well, quickly growing sick of each other, as she fails to comprehend his self-absorbed passion and obsessive devotion to music, as that’s time he’s not spending with her, while he never mentions her to his friends and fails to introduce her to his visiting family, played, surprisingly enough, by the actor’s real family, so there’s an emotional disconnect, despite such a dramatically visualized effort to emphasize a near idyllic initial attraction.  It’s a strange shift of fate, which they never really discuss, as this is a film that eliminates any hint of intimate conversation, where the social awkwardness resembles the mumblecore films of Andrew Bujalski, who similarly came out of the Harvard Film School which features a very documentary-heavy program, becoming a choreographed ballet of shifting emotions, copying the template of Demy, yet the emotional indifference exhibited here is in stark contrast to the vivacious energy and elegant luster of Demy’s films, where each of the characters are more closely defined, and the spaces in-between shine with a poetic realism.  As Elena drifts apart, she’s once again alone in the city, seen in combatant situations with rudely overzealous young men on the street making obnoxious come-ons, where a strange older man named Frank (Frank Garvin) tries a less obvious technique, yet it’s a come-on just the same, simply presented in a more politely palatable manner, with rather amusing results.  Much of the film features street scenes, including street vendors, performance artists, and children playing in fountains, where there’s an interactive quality with the city of Boston, showcasing several of their parks and monuments, with the characters drifting around Copley, the Back Bay, and South End, yet one overriding feature throughout this film is a heavy reliance upon extreme close-ups, where an intimacy is achieved through the camera’s love affair with facial portraiture, while also exploring an interesting social dynamic, as Palmer is black, Khin is Asian, and Garcia is Hispanic.  The real showstopper, however, is a Godard-inspired musical number paying reverence to the iconic café dance, Bande à Part - Madison Cafe Dance Scene - Jean-Luc Godard YouTube (3:50), by Anna Karina in Band of Outsiders (Bande à Part) (1964), as Madeline is stuck in a monotonous waitressing routine at a mostly empty fish shack, taking orders from some clueless manager, yet suddenly she breaks out in another song, The Boy in the Park YouTube (4:55), adding an inexplicable tap-dancing routine (Boston tap legend Julia Boynton from the Harvard Dance Program was a dance consultant), joined by the rest of the wait staff, becoming an idealized vision of the kind of unbridled freedom she never has, all playing out in her mind, expressed with the kind of infectious joy missing from the rest of the picture, which may be what Chazelle imagined before shooting the film.  It leads to a very clever ending, which recalls the pitch perfect finale of Richard Linklater’s Before Sunset (2004), as the couple reunites again under fortuitous circumstances, where in a single take the young director captures the beauty of wordless expression, exactly what this film has been searching for, while also discovering a new meaning in their lives.     

Postscript

According to the Trivia section of IMDb, Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench (2009) - Trivia, shortly after completing this film, a friend suggested Chazelle watch the Barry Jenkins film Medicine for Melancholy (2008), another contemporary black and white indie film, while around the same time a friend of Barry Jenkins told him to watch this film shortly after completion of his film.  Both directors were up for numerous Academy Awards in 2017 for their critically acclaimed films, Chazelle’s film 2016 Top Ten List #10 La La Land won Best Director, the youngest recipient to ever win at the age of 32, while the Barry Jenkins film 2016 Top Ten List #1 Moonlight won Best Film.  Neither was aware of these earlier recommendations until they spoke after the Oscar gala ceremony, discovering they were inextricably linked.