SUPPORTED CONTENT
GROWING PAINS
No two coming-of-age stories are quite the same, and several films in this year’s selection explore the hilarious, painful and downright bizarre process of finding your place in the adult world. EIFF 2019 kicks off with such a saga in the anarchic comedy Boyz in the Wood, which finds a rag-tag gang of teenage boys heading off into the Highlands to complete their Duke of Edinburgh Award, only to lose their way and get stalked by a pair of tweed-wearing toffs. Balance, Not Symmetry follows Glasgow art student Caitlin (Laura Harrier) in her struggle to cope after her father’s untimely death, and finding inspiration in audacious new peer Hannah (Bria Vinaite). Another distinctly Scottish tale comes from Schemers, which sees a group of Dundonian pals hustling hard circa 1979, as they run discos, survive local mobsters and try to book Iron Maiden to play at the Caird Hall.
Joining them is the hard-hitting drama Farming, based on writer and director Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje’s own childhood. Young Enitan (Damson Idris) is ‘farmed out’ by his Nigerian parents to a white family in the hopes that he’ll have a better future, but ends up falling in with a white skinhead gang. Or if Endgame has left you hankering for your next superhero fix, Brightburn offers a twist on the classic Superman origin story, which sees an alien child raised by loving humans who encourage him to use his powers for good, but there’s a darkness in him that cannot be denied.
From top: The Black Forest, The Wind, End of Sentence
BUMP IN THE NIGHT FAMILY FEUD
The unknown inspires some of our greatest fears, either real or imagined. Several thrillers this year explore this most primal terror, including Gwen’s macabre depiction of an isolated Welsh town turning against a teenage girl after an inexplicable string of sheep slaughter and crop failure. We Have Always Lived in the Castle adapts Shirley Jackson’s seminal Gothic mystery, which follows the dissolution of the Blackwood family upon the arrival of a mysterious cousin (Sebastian Stan), who raises the spectre of an unsolved family tragedy. Such eerie psychological disturbances also take root on the American frontier
in The Wind, in which Lizzy Macklin’s (Caitlin Gerard) new life in the desolate wilderness is haunted by her paranoia about a couple living in a nearby cabin, upending the western’s traditionally masculine gaze. Aspiring park ranger Wendy (Karina Fontes) must likewise keep her wits about her when she stumbles across a corpse in Body at Brighton Rock, and must wait with it until help arrives in the morning – if she can survive whatever is lurking in the deep, dark woods.
‘Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.’ Tolstoy’s words ring particularly true in this year’s line-up of domestic dramas. Among its more tender offerings include The Black Forest, which finds tensions fizzing to the surface as two families holiday in Germany together, while End of Sentence sees an estranged father and son reunite for a trip to Ireland to spread their wife and mother’s ashes. Meanwhile, a pair of sisters grapple with the discovery that their long-deceased mother is still in fact very much alive as a veteran soap star in Before You Know It. Things take a darker turn in Strange But True, which finds Melissa (Margaret Qualley) show up on the doorstep of her boyfriend Ronnie’s (Connor Jessup) family home, pregnant with a child that she insists is his — despite the fact he died five years earlier. Meanwhile, the indomitable Olivia Colman stars in Them That Follow, in which an accidental pregnancy tests the faith of those in an extreme Pentecostal community that practices the deadly ritual of snake- handling. Edinburgh International Film Festival, various venues, Wed 19– Sun 30 Jun, edfilmfest.org.uk
1 Jun–31 Aug 2019 THE LIST 31 1 Jun–31 Aug 2019 THE LIST 31