Actress Rebecca Hall met with a producer by the name of Nina Yang Bongiovi here in New York back in 2018 as Bongiovi had a particular interest in a project that Hall was behind.
Hall had written a script based on a 1929 Nella Larsen novella called Passing, about an African-American woman from Harlem who has a chance encounter with an old childhood friend who is passing herself off as white.
Bongiovi realized Hall hoped to also make her directorial debut on the film as well, but she told Hall that it may not be a good idea for a white woman to direct a film about two African-American woman...especially when one of them is trying to pass as a white lady.
Then Hall dropped the bombshell:
Her own mother would partake of "passing".
(Hall with Thompson/Negga on set)
Hall's mother, opera singer Maria Ewing, was biracial and she married the white British theatre icon Peter Hall. In an interview with the LA Times, Hall went into this history a little more:
HALL: "There is a history of white-passing in my family. My whole life was sort of known and not known; talked about and not talked about. There really wasn't a language for passing. The novel offered a context and a historical understanding for what must have happened in my family".
Passing is a novella that I was not familiar with and due to that, I can't say if Hall changed a lot of attributes about the story. What I CAN say is that Hall seems like the right person to adapt such material and I feel that for her debut, she was remarkably assured and confident and it is clear that her vision was very singular and distinct.
Before going into the acting, I want to discuss Hall's choices on how to present the film because I can see why it might alienate some but I would not be among that group.
Hall's vision for the film was for it to feel as if it were a movie lost to time in a lot of ways. Aside from shooting it in black & white, she also opted to shoot it in 4:3 aspect ratio which only seems to pop up these days when we watch an old TV show or movie that hasn't been remastered following the HD switchover.
That rich cinematography compliments the late 20s aesthetic very well: the production design, the costumes, the hairstyles, etc... but when I was watching the first moments between Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga, I wasn't quite sure what to make of them.
I then realized what Hall was going for and then upon reading interviews following the film, it further established what I picked up on: the acting style matches the films of the era in a lot of ways.
The previously mentioned "lost in time" angle is very apparent in how Thompson and particularly Negga act in their roles.
Ruth Negga, a former Oscar nominee of 2016's Loving, has the task of playing Clare, the one who is passing herself off as white. Her whole demeanor and look screams that of other white women that dominated the pre-Code era of Hollywood like Norma Shearer, Mary Pickford, Clara Bow, and Joan Crawford. It has a sort of stylized edge that may seem a little unnatural at first glance but as I watched her, I couldn't help but be drawn in by her. Negga's performance is one of those that doesn't necessarily have big, flashy moments but her screen presence is undeniable. She also knows how to use her big expressive eyes to great effect.
I was also very taken with Tessa Thompson as Irene. While she doesn't slip into a lot of the early talkie acting styles in the same way Negga does, Thompson's presence is quite sterling and you feel a lot of restraint and repressed emotions that are bubbling under the surface.
The two of them make for one of the best duos I have seen in a film in quite some time.
As a whole film, I can admit that certain moments felt a little bit slow or that the film doesn't seem to care about any of the characters beyond Thompson's Irene or Negga's Clare...but in the end, I felt that the film was very successful in what it set out to do.
The more I think about the film, the more it just lingers with me like some sort of dream.
Hall should have a marvelous future if she wants to keep writer/director as part of her resume and it goes without saying that she, Tessa Thompson, and Ruth Negga need to be in the conversation this awards season.
A truly fascinating and gorgeous film.
RATING: 4.5/5
No comments:
Post a Comment