THIS PLACE: 2 ½ STARS. “story is heartfelt and has a pleasing intimacy to it.”
“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.
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