CRITIQUE:


By the mention of British films, it’s either a period costume drama or an angsty-ridden socially-subversive flick would surface to mind. Start a roll-call and you’d get Keira Knightley sporting a morose, tragically besotted look, or Helen Mirren getting all regal, or perhaps skinhead hooligans cavorting around, throw in some class divide issues, amp up the bitter tales – and the next best thing could be either a BAFTA or an Oscar. Emerging out of these cluster of films are little indie gems which are little seen publicly but critically appreciated, and Pawel Pawlikowski’s idyllic and moody MY SUMMER OF LOVE is a paradigm. The title itself suggests that it must be one of those films that goes straight into DVDs without ever seeing the cinematic silverscreen light of day, but hold your judgment for this had won BAFTA’s Best British Film of 2005.


What delineates this from the rest of the film from that year was that it never bathed itself in self-importance. Instead, it centres on the tale that it wants to tell, no pretensions, no big stars, less budgeting and more on characterisation. Little less do we see films nowadays that are carried by the complexity of its characters rather than a mere moving plot. And here, it’s the characters that move the plot itself.


Here we meet two young ladies amid the backdrop of a tranquil Yorkshire countryside summer. One, Mona (Natalie Press) a confused, lonely working-class teenager, and another, Tamsin (Emily Blunt), a spoilt upper-class daydreaming-enthusiast, both form an unusual type of friendship that borders on lesbianism. Another good step taken by the film is that it never mentions the homosexual order, but rather portrays the two girls with a friendship that is both drawn from mutual understanding, summer boredom, and eroticism. It is languid and sensual, but it doesn’t edges on the exploitative.


And what visuals. For an indie film, hence low-profile, it boosts a sheer vibrant naturalistic photography, with images of the countryside as soft and dreamlike as its tale. The performances also shine, mainly from the two leads, the absorbing Press and the terrific Blunt, embodying their characters in near-perfectionism. However, its main pitfall is in its predictability (we all know where the relationship is heading to) but incessantly recovers in its denouement, a slow-burning jolt to the senses that pulls the audience back to reality, an effective closure to the tale. At its heart, it’s the two girls’ dark feelings and complicatedness that serve as the underlying emotion of this film; Tamsin and her artistic license, her manipulation, and her social belonging, a polarity to Mona’s vulnerability and lower upbringing – basically a tale about the division of the classes. Again, it’s a British film.


VERDICT:

As what the title suggests, this coming-of-age drama is like a summer fling: sweet, brief, bitter and disheartening altogether. Yet it’s the tale of these two girls’ summer escapade that defines the deeper, darker issues that broil beneath.



RATING: B+