David O'ConnellMIFF 2010: The Unloved/Poetry
August 5th 2010 04:52
The Unloved
Samantha Morton’s directorial debut is another bleak tale of domestic dysfunction from that familiar sphere of gritty British drama occupied most notably by Ken Loach and Mike Leigh. Though not as confronting as other auspicious debuts, like Gary Oldman’s Nil By Mouth (1997) for example, The Unloved is still a grim and testing experience, the landscapes of Morton’s childhood smeared with industrial grey and the scattered pieces of drab and broken down lives.
Indeed Morton’s own experiences form the basis of Tony Grisoni's delicate screenplay. The story itself, of an 11 year old girl, Lucy (Molly Windsor), forced into a foster home for children because of the ineptness of both her separated parents, is reasonably conventional. What elevates the film is Morton’s subtle but brilliant direction which is able to extract discoloured, unsettling poetry from the girl’s environment, often amplifying tiny details with a unique perspective, be it an interesting camera angle or a strangely unsettling static shot.
Windsor is good rather than great; her stoicism is set like concrete early on so although there’s a perceived lack of range she’s actually perfect for this girl who seems to accept her fractured path as if it’s a perfectly normal outcome. Robert Carlyle and Susan Lynch as Lucy’s parents are both given a couple of decent scenes, whilst Lauren Socha as Lucy's roommate and surrogate sister gives a startling, uninhibited performance. But what the film’s success ultimately boils down to is the conviction of Morton’s work behind the camera.
The Unloved was actually first released on television in the UK but it’s a welcome addition to this year’s Festival with all its authentic and gritty imperfections attached. At no point does Morton allow the film to be consumed by sentimentality and for this reason alone it deserves to be championed as the first strident words of a new cinematic voice.
Poetry
More than anything, Lee Chang-dong’s Poetry is a masterful character study of an older woman, Mija (Yun Jung-hee), struggling to come to terms with the early stages of Alzheimer’s. In the meantime she finds meaning in her life through the discovery of poetry in a creative class for elderly people in her community. Against the backdrop of Mija's day to day interactions are her relationship with the grandson she’s been lumbered with, and a disabled man she performs maid duties for.
The opening scene of the film reveals the body of a schoolgirl floating down a river and the mystery of what happened to her becomes an interesting subplot in its own right. Mija later discovers her grandson’s role in events which led to the girl’s eventual suicide - a distasteful situation that creates a moral conundrum, especially after the parents of other implicated boys become involved.
But at the heart of Poetry is Yun jung-hee’s mesmerizing central portrayal of a dignified woman caught in a moral dilemma whilst simultaneously battling assorted inner demons and hoping for a fresh perception of the world through the inspiration of words.
The leisurely pacing may be off-putting to some but there's no denying that it allows for a fully-formed character to emerge - an all-too rare occurence in the cinema these days. Even if the film’s length, at 130 minutes, seems a tad excessive, it’s still no chore to sit through a work as confident and mature as this - and one that deservedly won the coveted best screenplay award at Cannes recently.
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