| RATING: | 100% |
| FORMAT: | DVD |
An impressive achievement on a low budget, this is ultimately a human and humane drama about the human face. They loom large throughout and offer us glimpses into character - and great character acting. They determine our own emotional allegiances and those of the characters surveyed; while forming the basis for the entire plot and story. Moreover, the landscape itself is a character in its own right that supports the human figures in this deeply rural context via the expressive photography.
Unsurprisingly, the Anglican Church is collaborating with the rich to keep the poor subservient and landless; while sermonizing on each man keeping his place that appointed him of god. This is, of course, a film about boat rockers from whom the dramatic conflicts shown spring. This film is a hymn to strong leadership and communal values: A theme of which it never loses sight despite its length. It is also a hymn of praise to the expressive possibilities of cinema itself.
The narrative progression is both parallel and chronological in its poetically non linear way. This is a slow moving and beautiful experience – both in an ethical and in an aesthetic sense. The film is shot as a silent movie with emotions conveyed largely by bodily movement and facial expression. Plus, the different acting styles convey different moods in a movie part of whose brilliance lies in the extremely deft casting choices, particularly Robin SOANS as the rebel leader.
The cheerful anachronisms of the single finger, the poor characters' good teeth, breaking the fourth wall and the modern dialogue are all experimental ways of helping the director (Bill DOUGLAS) make these people real to us now. Furthermore, the movie comments on its own illusionism with the Brechtian leitmotif of an itinerant magic lantern show using the same actor (the brilliantly versatile Alex NORTON) for the characters that comment on the action - and sometimes take part in it. By appearing in various guises, NORTON enables this entire bag of cinematic tricks to cohere into a political masterpiece – all the more effective because it does not ram its various points down our throats.
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