Aftersun [DVD]

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But man, that ending comes along and wallops you, and you realize all at once that the movie is about so much, and that's it's been gradually revealing its layers to you all along. It's a sensitive film and one that leaves you enthralled and attached to the characters on a deeply human level even if that dramatic colonel doesn't pop the way you might except. Composer Oliver Coates weaves his way in and out of the film’s emotional labyrinth, while deftly chosen needle drops (including a mashed-up vocal version of the Queen-David Bowie hit Under Pressure) put us right there in the moment. That night, Calum and Sophie share a dance together to " Under Pressure" in a loving embrace on the last night of their holiday.

When the father and the daughter were dancing under the sound of David Bowie in the end, it was a sad and beautiful scene, especially when you listen to this particular song's lyrics. Aftersun is an intimate and moving portrait of a father and daughter relationship that, according to the director who was at this Toronto International Film Festival screening, is loosely based on real people and her own life. With the final realisation that this was Sophie's last time she spent with her father before he (most likely) commit suicide. My (wise) wife Anne suggests Aftersun sounds like a catchy name for a sunguard lotion, something to treat burns.

For example, on first viewing one wouldn't know the dark-haired woman dancing is the the adult Sophie, whose memories of a holiday with her father 22 years earlier make up the narrative. Don't think this is is yet another traumatic arthouse film with ambiguous narrative that drags out and goes nowhere. Aftersun is an unfortunate conjunction of four topics widely covered by fiction: the autobiographical, the point of view, the subtlety and dead times.

It was released in the United States on 21 October 2022 and in the United Kingdom on 18 November 2022.Like the fragmented family it depicts, the film requires of its viewer connection, engagement, commitment. I read that she wasn't privy to Mescal's solo scene rehearsals, so that she wasn't fully aware of what his character was going through, much the same as her character Sophie wasn't. We meet young, separated father Calum ( Normal People’s Paul Mescal) and his 11-year-old daughter, Sophie (screen newcomer Frankie Corio), on holiday together in Turkey in the late 1990s. A reflection of a time when eyes were new, interpretation was a seed, as yet to grow, but when you look back now, it's a different world somehow, revealing spaces not yet entered, or sought to go.

Sophie is smart for her age (she and Calum are sometimes mistaken for siblings) but she’s still also very much a child, torn between hanging out with the younger kids at the resort or with the more boisterous teenagers who lounge around the pool table.About how their love can be felt despite their faults and despite the sufferings we never knew about.

Gregory Oke’s cinematography captures the colour of memory, with bright exteriors and glowing surfaces carefully graded by Kath Raisch to evoke vivid snapshots of fleeting moments.The viewer is invited to join the dots on what has happened between the two timelines and there are several clues that help. As time passes, and Sophie's adolescence begins to fade, she holds tight to the memories of her time with her father while she learns more about the man he really is. These tensions between child and adult perspectives, between naivety and understanding, between experience and loss can always be interesting. A lot of things here are absolutely outstanding - the direction, the bond between the two main characters, and the screenplay.