Mike Leigh’s first feature “Bleak Moments” has those awkward silences, smiles without sweats and the offers to fill the cup with coffee or tea as the space within the people are empty. It makes the film tough to deal as with the people in it; lonely, detached and suppress the hiding emotions. But then there is a chance and an opportunity for those desperate silences to have a closure in “Bleak Moments”.Sylvia (Anna Raitt) a middle class secretary takes care of her mentally challenged sister Hilda (Sarah Stephenson) in a match box apartment. Her colleague Pat (Joolia Cappleman) is her only visitor and friend in an otherwise mundane aloof life she leads on. She buys wine and drinks it in solitude, not for enjoyment but for her yearning pleasure of a social life. Her evenings are marked with tea sessions. She has a boyfriend who has more hesitations, fear, desperation and shyness than Sylvia. He is a teacher who tries too hard to impress Hilda and get on the good side of Sylvia but he does not realize that it is of no need.
I was exasperated by these literal “bleak” moments the film goes on in the beginning. The relentless motion in the dead air is deafening. The slightest bit of sound becomes an instant welcome for some activity. The film takes its subtle twist in the form of territorial feeling of insecurity when a shabby print worker rents the garage. His name is Norman (Mike Bradwell) who duplicates materials for a magazine. He plays guitar and sings. This is a welcome change for Sylvia and Hilda. Sylvia invites him over for tea. Then one evening he is joined merrily in her house with music and genuine smiles. Watch when Pat comes in for her baby sitting Hilda who is her favourite and in a boorish manner interrupts the music and watch how Peter tries to maintain his reign of the male presence in Sylvia’s life to Norman. They are afraid that the bridge connecting their relationship with Sylvia and Hilda might be strained by this sudden happiness and deviation. Solitude and suppressing emotions are the things which keep them in tandem.
But Sylvia likes Peter and they go to a restaurant and there is a lonely customer (Reginald Stewart) whose body language tells that he is alone not of abandonment but by choice. He does not look like a person to appreciate a nice couple. His eyes are mocking on these couple whom he very well might consider the losers who chose to come to this deserted restaurant with a restless waiter (Ronald Eng). And following that is the high point of the film when Peter and Sylvia are at her house waiting for the move to happen. Sylvia is the most outgoing considering her strawberry smiles when the awkwardness posed by the waiter, the man or Peter himself over the ambience. Peter on the other hand thinks twice before drinking a glass of wine. He is the person whose mind churns the levers of insecurity and fear of rejection/morality while sipping coffees or making circling endless conversations. Again Leigh brings the void in between these people and the creak sounds the movement of a person makes in an apartment is irritating but glad too for something to cover this abysmal space of emotions.
“Bleak Moments” is an art house film which does take patience and sensitive ears to absorb the muttered sounds of these characters. While I shed more light on Sylvia and Peter it tells the overall story of the middle class people whose job and lifestyle are never punctuated for lively expectation of the following day. Nothing happens and responsibilities too have shifted its form from sacrifice, love to tasteless chores. Sylvia, Peter and Pat are all bound by it and they do want to get out of it at least for a moment. Yet they have been stuck in it forever that they are neither comfortable nor daring enough. Sylvia yet tries to make some attempt towards a change in her life but the people surrounding her are not ready to do the same.
Leigh’s “Naked” and this one tells his understanding on these middle class personalities and I believe most of his other movies concentrate on it too. Thinking about it, Hollywood has rarely attempted in centering the middle class people in US. Or to be precise the finance and the living scenario of them have not been ventured upon with the subtlety Leigh has taken on. But middle class are becoming a luxury class and the gap between them and the next financial class has enlarged and widened. Leigh in this emotional vacuum of characters makes us realize the inundate influence of their lifestyle.
No comments:
Post a Comment