#abanquet

SYNOPSIS: Widowed mother of two, Holly is radically tested when her firstborn teenage daughter Betsey experiences a profound epiphany and insists that her body is no longer her own, but in service to a higher power. Bound to her newfound belief, Betsey refuses to eat but loses no weight. Her younger daughter Isabelle and her mother June feel the strain that Betsey’s actions are having on their relationships.  In an harrowing dilemma, torn between love and fear, Holly endures Betsey’s credence and faces head on the boundaries of her own beliefs.

REVIEW: Director Ruth Paxton and writer Justin Bull’s A BANQUET is a complex tapestry of characters and themes interwoven with elegant and unsettling visuals. The character dynamics are fraught with tension and discord that are unsettling, but are simply beguiling to watch.

The narrative takes this family dynamic that centers on a mother’s love and then sets up these relationships that begin to grind on each other. The plot begins from a place of normal daily life that comes with its own set of pressures. Holly, the mother, is trying to hold everything together after her husband’s illness and suicide. The girls are also dealing with the loss of their father. Betsey is a senior and dealing with all that pressure, including trying to sort her plans to go, or not go, to university. Isabelle is facing her own peer pressures, skating and becoming a teenager. There is an undercurrent of emotional pressure that is left to stew when Betsey has this encounter that adds a new element into the family dynamic. There are surreal and supernatural elements that are hinted at but never fully confirmed. Holly’s mother June adds more fuel to the fire as she is a stoique, traditionalist who offers some context that further destabilizes any grasp of what might be going on here. The story takes a leap forward and Betsey’s beliefs have metamorphosed to encompass the end of days. The end is coming. It skillfully hooks itself into the contemporary feeling of doom hanging over the audience. It builds into a crescendo that resonates like the final piano strike in the Beatles song “A Day in a Life.” As the ending fades out that narrative leaves it up to the view to interpret what they’ve just witnessed.

Having studied religion and mythology, I appreciated the way the narrative drew upon the ancient tales of spiritual individuals and the role of fasting to enhance their spiritual stats to connect to the other, the divine. The stories of their mental states, the role the full moon plays in some religions and the symbolism of the maiden, mother and crone symbolism to the tale. It adds to the rich symbolism and allows the story to work on multiple levels. To that extent, it operates as a contemporary Greek tragedy.

The visuals are breathtaking, fascinating, and horrifying. There are these shadows and muted tones in the interiors of the house. Then there are these explosions of color when it comes to the food. Even some of the draker green foods have vibrant colors that pop. The colors are in such contrast to the environment that as Holly prepares them it has a quality to it that feels like the most graphic murder scene from a slasher film. The filmmakers do an amazing job manipulating the lighting, playing with the colors, framing the scene, and editing it together to create this lyrical and disturbing visual poetry. I had to watch it a second time just to watch the artistry of the smoke and mirrors that create so much with so little, so simply.

The score by CJ Mirra, which is the alias for composer John Sampson, the breath that adds the final level of tension and suspense to the film. It moves around in the film quietly working as sound design, always lingering, always unnerving. It slowly encroaches into scenes enhancing the visuals and finally comes crashing down as a scene erupts with emotion. It’s a bewitching score that adds so much to the film.

This is a magnificent ensemble cast. Every actress goes through a progression of emotional changes. Sienna Guillory who plays Holly, the mother, delivers an emotional and heartfelt performance that chronicles this pain and suffering she endures for the sake of her family and ultimately her daughter. Jessica Alexander provides an engaging performance that captures this unsettling  character arc. She keeps the viewer off balance. Is what she is experiencing real, or something else. If it is something else, her force of will is frightening. She brings a sense of innocence and loss to the character. Ruby Stokes plays Isabelle. She creates this vibrant young girl through the madness going on around her to an extreme that exudes frustration and anger. She becomes this spectator with all this pent up anger that finally explodes. Actress Lindsay Duncan is June, the mother/grandmother. She is a traditional, proper, British wife and mother. She provides this reserved empathy and strength to the role that struggles to help right this family’s ship. These women allow you to feel this is a family, their unique character dynamics that tear at the boundaries of this unit and a profound empathy for the family as a whole and the individual characters.

Director Sienna Guillory is clearly a student of the cinema. There are nuances of other directors' styles that are folded into this film to clearly create a unique and powerful vision. You can feel her passion for the material as she intertwines the performances with the visual elements to invoke a palpable sense of dread. From the opening scene to the final shot it is a relentless, atmospheric journey that pulls on the heartstrings and hopes for release from this poetic nightmare. This is a psychological cinematic venture into the dark recess of the human soul that requires a stiff drink and a few quiet moments of reflection upon viewing. Undoubtedly a gift filmmaker who we will have the pleasure, or horror, to hear from again very soon.

CAST: Sienna Guillory, Jessica Alexander, Ruby Stokes, Kaine Zajaz, and Lindsay Duncan. CREW: Director - Ruth Paxton; Screenplay - Justin Bull; Producers - Nik Bower, Leonora Darby, James Harris, Mark Lane, & Laure Vaysse; Cinematographer - David Liddell; Score - CJ Mirra; Editor - Matyas Fekete; Production Designer - Sofia Stocco; Costume Designer - Kirsty Halliday; Creature Designer - Dan Martin; Visual Effects Supervisor - Richard Blackburn. OFFICIAL: N.A. FACEBOOK: N.A. TWITTER: N.A. TRAILER: https://youtu.be/zVZfglJ6bS0 RELEASE DATE: In Select Theaters, on Digital Platforms & VOD on February 18th, 2022

**Until we can all head back into the theaters our “COVID Reel Value” will be similar to how you rate a film on digital platforms - 👍 (Like), 👌 (It’s just okay),  or 👎 (Dislike)