2024 Top Ten List #2 All of Us Strangers

Writer/director Andrew Haigh

Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott

Haigh on the set with Paul Mescal

Haigh with cinematographer Jamie D. Ramsay

ALL OF US STRANGERS                  A                                                                                 Great Britain  USA  (105 mi)  2023  ‘Scope  d: Andrew Haigh

Little things I should have said and done, I never took the time.                                                  —Always On My Mind, The Pet Shop Boys, 1987

British-born writer/director Andrew Haigh, creator of Weekend (2011), 45 Years (2016), and Lean On Pete (2017), has crafted his most mature and compelling work, a haunting meditation on loneliness that offers more than a few surprises, emotionally raw and deeply connecting, expressing a unique vulnerability that is brilliantly told, feeling very grown up, where nothing else like it comes to mind, as it really establishes its own unorthodox path, where the reflective originality is literally off the charts without using any cinematic trickery.  What truly stands out is just how achingly personal it is, where every single moment feels heartfelt, and the title tells all, poetically revealing how we all revolve around each other’s lives, like planets in alignment, reminiscent of that spectacular opening sequence in Béla Tarr’s WERCKMEISTER HARMONIES (2000), Werckmeister Harmonies (Opening Scene - GR-EN sub) YouTube (10:12).  The degree of complexity in this film is surprising, as it starts out simple enough, with nothing out of the ordinary, where the realist aesthetic becomes ingrained with viewers, setting the tone for what follows, providing the building blocks of an intense theatrical exploration of memory and identity, loosely adapting Taichi Yamada’s 1987 Tokyo-based novel Strangers, the first recipient of the Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize, changing the central character to a gay man with the blessing of Yamada (who died recently at the age of 89) and his family, who were incredibly respectful of Haigh’s vision of finding hope in dark places.  At the center of the story is Irish actor Andrew Scott as Adam, a reclusive writer working on a story that has to do with his past and his deceased parents, currently living alone on the 27th floor of a block high-rise building with a panoramic view of the London landscape below, where the clouds on the horizon offer a contemplative vantage point, recalling Sofia Coppola’s far-reaching hotel room vista in Lost in Translation (2002), or the quiet perch in Spike Jonze’s futuristic Her (2013), where the window in each case is a barrier to the world outside.  Despite the massive size of what appears to be a new building, it is strangely deserted, where it comes as a surprise that he is the only one exiting during a fire drill, an incident that allows Adam to spot his only neighbor in a window, Harry (Paul Mescal from 2023 Top Ten List #7 Aftersun), who pays him a visit afterwards in an excessively awkward flirtatious gesture that reveals his off-putting drunken state, with a half-empty bottle of Japanese whisky in his hands, ALL OF US STRANGERS | “Do I Scare You” Clip | Searchlight Pictures YouTube (54 seconds).  He’s younger and more gregarious, but Adam declines the invitation, as he’s largely a solitary figure, but has second thoughts afterwards, believing there’s something there, and a short time later the two reconnect as gay lovers, where the awkwardness of an initial sexual encounter is everpresent, yet there’s also a heartfelt connection that bonds them together, some of which comes from sharing the difficulties they each encountered from the realization they were gay.  Both are estranged from their families and share the same feeling of alienation and not belonging, with Adam confessing he lost his parents in a car crash thirty years earlier just before he turned twelve years old, with Harry sensing that kind of pain never goes away, leaving Adam suddenly flooded by memories of his past, while Harry is himself trapped by his own struggles with drugs and alcohol.  Rising to the surface are grief and loss, with elements of warmth, melancholy, loneliness, and sorrow, opening a dialogue between the past and the present, something that was previously explored in Céline Sciamma’s Petite Maman (2021), or more recently Miyazaki’s The Boy and the Heron (Kimitachi wa dô ikiru ka) (2023).  But this is something different altogether, a profoundly moving experience that may leave some emotionally shattered, becoming a deeply philosophical Proustian essay on the power of love and the power of remembrance.   

Andrew Haigh films are known for being quiet, intimate, well-acted, and intensely real, where the root of them all is an emotional honesty expressed with extraordinary tenderness, where his eloquent use of music and camera movement feels effortlessly fluid and graceful, a bit like Xavier Dolan, luring us into an emotionally devastating fictional world that viewers are suddenly thrust into, as if we’re living it ourselves.  Premiering at the Telluride Film Festival, this is another LGBTQ story with a surreal aspect to it, bearing some resemblance to Enys Men (2022), as each is a brilliantly original exposé on loneliness, but things are expressed quite differently, conveyed largely through conversations, with regular bursts of humor in highlighting the absurdities of the situation, where it’s such a deeply personal and imaginative vision that it takes us places where we’ve never been, much of it stemming from the unique architectural blueprint from the Yamada novel.  While stuck on a page that simply reads “External, suburban house, 1987,” this film leaves audiences continually off-balance, as we question what we’re seeing, wondering just what to make of it all, taking place in a netherworld of memory and the imagination, where there’s a textured, indelible sense of pathos running through the entire film, which feels more like a metaphysical experience.  The overall weirdness may not work for everyone, but this is a director at the height of his powers pressing the artistic boundaries in pursuit of something completely different, where it’s a bit of a challenge to keep up with the dizzying turns in the road, but the place he takes us is something to be cherished.  Some twenty or thirty minutes into the film, Haigh pulls the rug out from underneath us, leaving us floating on air in a state of suspended incomprehension and disbelief, where it doesn’t matter if it defies all rational logic, as he instead creates an immensely satisfying alternative universe, with no explanation, and simply leaves us there to fend for ourselves.  While off on a long walk, Adam encounters a strange man (Jamie Bell) and follows him into the suburban neighborhood of Croydon, where we thoroughly expect an anonymous sexual encounter, but once they get to the door, the man happily introduces Adam to his wife (Claire Foy from 2023 Top Ten List #1 Women Talking), only to discover they affectionately call him their son, someone they haven’t seen in a long while, which is an alarming development, ALL OF US STRANGERS | “Hi” Clip | Searchlight Pictures YouTube (30 seconds).  Viewers are quick to think they may be stepparents, or foster parents, yet the strange thing is there appears to be little difference in their age as they immediately rehash childhood memories, which are in no way idealized or romanticized, but presented matter-of-factly, exposing the obvious discomfort that generation either failed to recognize or ignored.  As mind-blowing as this seems, blurring the boundaries of reality, they’re actually picking up their relationship where it left off decades earlier (“Is this real?” he asks), having conversations with his parents that he never got to have, where they all seem perfectly comfortable with the visit afterwards, as if it was a cathartic experience, which only elevates the emotional authenticity of the reconnection, a very unusual way to tackle the haunting memories of grief and death, like traveling through an invisible portal.  In this ghost story, however, Haigh leaves out any horror or supernatural elements, and rather than being about the dead, it’s about the living communing with the dead, tapping into feelings people didn’t know they had.  In a subsequent visit with just his mother at home, ALL OF US STRANGERS | “You Were Just A Boy” Clip | Searchlight Pictures YouTube (2:00), Adam confesses he is openly gay, which hits her like a ton of bricks, not really bringing herself to believe what she hears, as it’s not what she ever envisioned, yet this is the moment every gay kid has with their parents, and it’s completely relatable.    

One of the unlocking keys to the film is viewing the album cover of Welcome to the Pleasuredome by Frankie Goes to Hollywood, a pivotal 1980’s album that exploded onto the music scene in a wave of controversy, where the blatant sexuality was groundbreaking, dangerous, and exciting, along with its immersion into gay culture during the AIDS epidemic of the 80’s which took so many innocent young lives.  This film is caught in a time warp, carrying the distinct experience of a specific generation of gay people growing up in the 80’s, battered by the relentless homophobia of the Reagan and Thatcher era where they were meant to feel ashamed and abandoned, as no one cared, where it’s not nostalgia, which can often hide the truth, but the burden of alienation and self-loathing still carried around by generations of grown-up gay children who have been traumatized from the harm done by an unsympathetic mainstream that was not inclined to question or reshape the world around them but simply accept the status quo.  Moving away from the traditional ghost story of the novel, Haigh creates something more psychological and distinctly metaphysical that is intentionally abstract in its revelations.  While the film takes place in a contemporary setting, the sequences when Adam returns to his childhood home to see his parents returns us to a 1980’s version of their world, where time has literally stopped, which has the effect of stepping into a dream, or a hazy, nostalgia-induced memory, where one of the more haunting sequences is a Christmas they spend together, with his mom humming along to an old Elvis tune as they decorate the tree, yet the cover version heard on TV with a gay lead singer has a completely different, more heartbreaking connotation for Adam, Pet Shop Boys - Always on my mind (Official Video) [4k Upgrade] YouTube (5:12).  In order to accentuate the realism and deep personal connection, these scenes were actually shot in Haigh’s childhood home, beautifully expressed on 35mm by cinematographer Jamie D. Ramsay, with rich colors and evocative lighting, exacerbating a feeling of being out of time, or in spaces inhabited only by the mind, while the eerie, mind-altering electronic musical score was conceived by Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch.  Haigh explores the complexities of both familial and romantic love, with Harry and Adam, in a moment of joyous abandon, heading out into the world together as a couple, where one of the film’s memorable sequences takes place in a nightclub, shot on location at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern, an iconic queer London institution which is entrenched with local history and culture, where the neon-lit color scheme immerses viewers in the richness of a drug-induced experience, ALL OF US STRANGERS | “Will You Look After Me?” Clip | Searchlight Pictures YouTube (55 seconds), which is a dizzying and terrifying turn, set to the music of Blur’s Death of a Party (2012 Remaster) - YouTube (4:33), where their loneliness mirrors one other, two men adrift, lost souls brought into each other’s lives, trapped by invisible scars that continue to inhibit their ability to connect with others.  Easily one of the more original and important films seen in a while, as it speaks to something that simply isn’t being told elsewhere.  There are wow moments in this film, achieved through exquisite writing and tender emotional restraint, where some of the most stunning moments come from quietly intimate deliveries, where the vast majority of the film’s complexities rest firmly on the shoulders of Adam, where much of the emotional punch comes from the tender, heart-wrenching, and healing bond between Adam and his parents, leading to one of the more powerful finales in recent memory, exemplified by a moment of infinite beauty and the majestic quality of Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Frankie Goes To Hollywood - The Power Of Love - Remastered - 4K - 5.1 Surround YouTube (5:05), suggesting that more than anything our lives revolve around the transcendent importance of relationships and the power of love.       

Andrew Haigh Answers All of My Burning Questions About ' ...  engaging Evan Ross Katz interview from Shut Up Evan, November 7, 2023

Our Town

 

Director Sam Wood

Playwright Thornton Wilder

Thornton Wilder

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

OUR TOWN              A-                                                                                                                USA  (90 mi)  1940  d:  Sam Wood

The day wouldn’t come when I wouldn’t want to know everything about our town.                       —George (William Holden)

Having fallen into public domain after the original copyright was never renewed, this film was repeatedly shown on television in badly mutilated copies, which remains the case even today, having never been restored, so less than pristine versions are all that’s currently available, which is a shame, as this is an iconic piece of Americana, adapted from Thornton Wilder’s one-of-a-kind, Pulitzer Prize-winning play (seen here, Our Town, 119-page play), often considered “the great American drama,” with fellow playwright Edward Albee heralding it as the best play ever written by an American, including a musical score written by American composer Aaron Copland, another Pulitzer Prize winner, with production design (aka art direction) by William Cameron Menzies.  Reputed to be the most performed play in the United States, performed by high schools and community theater groups across the country, this is a legendary play, where the theatrical version may be how most have been introduced to this film, which bears a similarity to Frank Capra’s IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946), which used to be shown on television every Christmas Eve for decades, both featuring a surprising surrealistic flourish where a central character has the capacity to revisit their lives from a heavenly perspective, offering renewed inspiration to the living.  Both are remarkable in their own ways, one released prior to WWII, and one released immediately afterwards, with actor Thomas Mitchell appearing in and figuring prominently in both, yet this film is intended to be written as a time capsule of ordinary American life, a quest for bucolic simplicity and a return to American innocence, beautifully preserved in all its modesty and glory, set at the dawn of the 20th century before the arrival of the automobile, succeeding brilliantly, having an influence on Orson Welles’ The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) as well as Capra’s IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946), not to mention the British duo of Powell and Pressburger’s A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH (1946), while Alfred Hitchcock was impressed enough to employ Thornton Wilder to co-write a polar opposite, his macabre portrait of evil lurking just under the surface of small town America in Shadow of a Doubt (1943), yet more than half a century later this still remains among the better depictions of small town life, characterized by the customary habit of no one ever locking their doors.  Directed by Sam Wood, who also directed two Marx Brother’s comedies, A NIGHT AT THE OPERA (1935) and A DAY AT THE RACES (1937), this film sneaks up on you, stringing together a series of what resembles routine and uneventful moments, giving way in the end to a metaphysical exploration of what comes after earthly life.  While the stage version uses no curtain and no scenery, defying the illusions and conventions of stage drama, becoming any town, taking place anywhere, not just New England, complete with archetypal references of Main Street, a town hall, school, churches, grocery store and the drug-store counter, played with a bare bones stage production that Lars von Trier emulated in DOGVILLE (2003), which allows the audience to visualize a world left behind, mirroring what ultimately happens to the main character in the last act.  The film, on the other hand, takes place in a small hamlet surrounded by fertile farmland and rolling hills, a pastoral idyll, filled with nothing more than ordinary moments, seemingly little more than simplicity itself, right down to the smallest detail, then it grabs you by the throat at the end and leaves a spellbinding effect, a real shock to the senses, striking at raw emotional nerves, becoming a glorified tearjerker, plumbing the depths of melodramatic excess and reaching into transcendent spiritual heights, offering a celestial combination of nostalgia and wisdom from beyond the grave.   

America is as much an idea as it is a place, where an imperfect democracy is viewed as constantly evolving, yet in a post-Depression America, the need for socioeconomic stability was paramount, perhaps more than any other time since the Civil War.  An enduring portrait of American stability and a microcosm of everyday life, where part of its enduring legacy is that it dares to be sentimental, provocatively suggesting American life is sentimental, yet the overall impression is that it rings true.  Revolving around an everpresent stage manager, Frank Craven, who provides the eloquent narration (while also performing minor roles), seen with pipe in hand speaking directly to the audience from some small corner in town, continually changing his location, offering an aw shucks view of normal life where not much of anything dramatic ever happens in the New Hampshire small town of Grover’s Corner (modelled apparently after Peterborough, New Hampshire where Wilder spent his summers), a town characterized by its small size, the intimate closeness of the characters, and their familiarity with each other, as everyone knows everybody else, goes to the same schools and the same churches, greeting one another on a first name basis, where gossip provides all the drama the town ever needs.  Taking place over four days in three different years, from 1901, 1904, and 1913, allowing the past to continually unfold into the present, the story concerns two families that live next door, including the town doctor, the only doctor in town, doing his rounds on foot, Dr. Gibbs (Thomas Mitchell) and his wife (Fay Bainter), while his neighbors are newspaper editor Mr. Webb (Guy Kibbee) and his wife (Beulah Bondi).  Their steadfast persistence reveals everything we need to know about them, never calling attention to themselves or viewing themselves as any different than anyone else, yet they are viewed with reverence by their children, who see their parents as perfect in every way, seemingly having no faults.  But Mrs. Gibbs has dreams of seeing Paris one day, yet duty and responsibility defines their everyday lives, never in all their years taking a day off, or even a summer vacation.  That Protestant work ethic is ingrained into their children, particularly in the geographical region once inhabited by Puritans, revealing a very young and near unrecognizable William Holden as George Gibbs, the guy next door who continually has his mind on baseball practice, and Oscar-nominated Martha Scott as Emily Webb, a dedicated student where learning comes easy, growing into high school sweethearts who ultimately get married and build a life together in Grover’s Corner.  Their relationship turns on a dime in a beautifully written drugstore scene when their awkward friendship turns into a romance right in front of our eyes in just a few revelatory moments.  Like George’s mother, Emily dreams that “once in your life before you die you ought to see a country where they don’t speak any English and they don’t even want to,” yet what’s emphasized is the importance of a thriving community, as those that live there rarely ever leave, with gravestones that go back as far as the 1600’s, as generation after generation have chosen to stay and settle down there, making this their home town.  Instead of feeling suffocatingly the same, the town offers the fleeting joys of experiencing day-to-day life, becoming an ode to small town life, something of a dying breed in the 20th century, with the stage manager, acting in a compassionate and reassuring role of a sympathetic Greek chorus, offering carefully considered observations, revealing, “This is the way we were in our growing up and in our marrying and in our doctoring and in our living and in our dying.” 

Offering a meditation on mortality, we’re quick to learn by the stage manager narration that an innocent paperboy seen onscreen performing his regular route will die fighting the war in France, while Mrs. Gibbs will die of pneumonia.  Revealed in such a matter-of-fact way, we soon realize this story is nothing less than the eternal story of humanity going back through eons of time, a subject so poetically elusive, so eloquent and, ultimately, so moving.  Instead of the big moments that grab all the allure and attention, what ultimately defines our lives may be seen in the smallest moments, where caught up in just living the everyday routine we may have missed the immediacy of the moment, the unique experiences that make us who we are, that precious mix of happiness and sorrow.  Given a second look at her life from the ghostly realms of the dead, Emily questions, “Do human beings ever realize life while they live it?—every, every minute?”  While that sounds like a utopian dream or a Buddhist transcendental state of nirvana, the question is how close can we really come?  Emily dies in childbirth while delivering her second child, a tragic figure of enormous dimensions, speaking to the other lingering dead souls who remain gathered around their headstones at the cemetery.  While the others feel an overly detached need to forget, immersed in a state of neverending timelessness, Emily remains as curious as ever, not yet ready to depart, wanting to remember as much as she can, returning back to an ordinary day, remarking upon feelings she never experienced before, seemingly taking life for granted, where she’s overcome by the overwhelming intensity of the moment, much more appreciative of those she’s leaving behind.  It’s a remarkably written final act, filled with surging emotions, literally communing with the voices of the eternal, where Emily’s sadness permeates throughout every scene, culminating with a strong desire to remain with the living, calling out “I want to live.  I want to live,” which actually happens in the film, as she awakens from a dream, a rewritten, much happier ending, something that never happens in the play.  It feels tacked on and completely unnecessary, as she’s already spent the same amount of time in the film coming to terms with her own death, where the depths of the tragedy have erupted onscreen, truly accounting for the profound sorrow, visibly expressing a cinematic purgatory that exists between the living and the dead, where she grows to accept the cycle of life for what it is, the story of humanity since the dawn of time, openly sharing her feelings with the audience, who have time to process and reconcile their conflicting emotions, only to flip the script in the last few seconds.  No doubt the theatrical version is more powerful, where life and death are intricately linked as part of the whole, yet the film accentuates the same tragedy, only changing course at the last minute.  While the movie is powerful enough, the Aaron Copland musical score is a perfect complement, providing the kind of fundamental pretext that served as a foundation for Leonard Bernstein, to whom the music was dedicated, in his score for Elia Kazan’s On the Waterfront (1954).  Written expressly for the film (losing the Academy Award for Best Original Score to Disney’s PINOCCHIO), it never resorts to maudlin sentiment or pulls at the heartstrings, Copland: Our Town (1940) - YouTube (10:52), not nearly as recognizable as Copland Conducts Appalachian Spring YouTube (27:10), or as bold as Fanfare for the Common Man YouTube (3:16), much smaller in scale, yet remains heartfelt and tender, capturing the essential nature of each and every lingering moment.