“This Place,” a new coming-of-adulthood film now playing in theatres, stars Kawennáhere Devery Jacobs and Priya Guns as two young women who must investigate their pasts to understand their present.
Jacobs (who also co-wrote and co-executive produced) plays Kawenniióhstha, a half-Mohawk, aspiring poet from Montreal who moves to Toronto to go to university and locate, and get to know, the Iranian father who left before she was born. “Can you imagine being okay with being forgotten or unacknowledged?” she asks.
When she leaves her writing notebook, containing all her work, at a laundromat, it leads to a meet cute with Malai (Priya Guns), a Tamil undergraduate student who lives with her older brother Ahrun (Alex Joseph) while figuring out her future.
Sparks immediately fly, and their friendship quickly turns into love, but before their relationship can fully blossom, each must deal with family issues.
As Malai learns that her estranged, alcoholic father (Muraly Srinarayanathas) is dying of cancer, she struggles with how to say goodbye. On the other hand, Kawenniióhstha must learn to say hello to her father Behrooz (Ali Momen). She learns of the complicated past shared by her parents, and her mother’s concern that if the truth about Kawenniióhstha’s father was known,blood quantum laws would deem her not Mohawk enough to live on the reservation.
As the two daughters of refugees grapple with the influence their familial connections have on their lives, it creates a strain in their relationship.
In a scant 87 minutes “This Place” covers a great deal of ground. The love story is the starting place as we get to know Kawenniióhstha and Malai, but the movie also touches on the generational trauma of genocide, parental expectations and otherness.
The love story is heartfelt and has a pleasing intimacy to it, even in its earliest stages but unfortunately, neither character is allowed the time to fully explore the repercussions of the film’s themes on their lives. They are not aided by dialogue that is too often stilted and obvious.
“This Place” has much going for it. The connection between the lead characters feels authentic, and their queerness is accepted and never questioned. But while it falters somewhat in its execution, the movie’s heart, and its messages of love, compassion and understanding, never do.
The very best zombie movies are never simply about the dead coming back to life. Sure, the good ones smear the screen with buckets of blood but just as important as the gore are the brains, and not just the kind the undead use as entrees. The memorable ones use the flesh-hungry creatures as metaphors for societal ills. George A. Romero knew this and infused his movies with allegories to social justice and consumerism, among other issues. Director Jeff Barnaby knows this as well. His exciting new zombie film, “Blood Quantum,” new to VOD this week, contains a powerful central premise: Indigenous people put in danger by allowing white folks on their land.
The film begins with an ancient settler’s proverb. “Take heed to thyself, make no treaty with the inhabitants of the land you are entering.” It’s a portentous warning that foreshadows “Blood Quantum” action. Set on an isolated Mi’gmaq reserve called Red Crow, it takes place before, during and after a plague that has turned most of the world into bloodthirsty zombies. The Red Crow, however, are immune, placing tribal sheriff Traylor (“Fear the Walking Dead’s” Michael Greyeyes) in the position of having to protect the reserve, including ex-wife Joss (Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers), sons Lysol (Kiowa Gordon) and Joseph (Forrest Goodluck), Joseph’s pregnant girlfriend Charlie (Olivia Scriven) and father Gisigu (Stonehorse Lone Goeman), from hordes of undead outsiders.
“Blood Quantum” offers up the blood and guts you expects from a movie like this but director Barnaby also infuses every frame with a vivid sense of indigenous heritage. From the title—which refers to a much-despised colonial blood measurement system used to establish a person’s Indigenous status—to using a zombie apocalypse as metaphor for the fight against annihilation by colonial settlers, it drips with social awareness and gore.
A new take on the zombie apocalypse tale, it brings a fresh perspective to a much-examined genre. The characters are well defined and have emotional arcs amid the madness and skull crushing. The use of occasional animation sections adds visual interest to an already cool looking film—Barnaby has a deadly eye for composition—and will even make you laugh from time to time. A broken narrative timeline doesn’t work as well it should but Barnaby and Co. deliver on entertainment and intellectual levels.
Come for the entrail eating, stay for the cultural observations… and more entrail eating.
