by Christine Westwood
The serene landscape of a park and river, forms the backdrop for two girls playing hide and seek among the trees, one calling plaintively to the other. The scene is a perfect metaphor for what is to follow.
We meet the girls again as older, retired women. Madeleine (Martine Chevallier) is the senior of the two, a widow and grandmother with a devoted, conservative daughter and a moody son.
Nina (Barbara Sukowa) lives in the apartment opposite to Madeleine. These ordinary seeming friends and neighbours have a secret. Their hide and seek games of childhood have become a gentle subterfuge masking their lifelong love affair.
Sharp, subtle direction and smart, spare writing characterise this first feature by writer/ director Filippo Meneghetti.
Menghetti’s previous work includes a documentary, Maistrac: lavorare in Cantiere (2009) and the thriller short, L’intruso (2012). His thriller sensibility is apparent in the deft sense of tension that drives Two of Us.
All of the elements at play are complemented by beautiful mise en scene. This is especially striking at the beginning, when the characters’ intimacy is expressed by gorgeous lighting and composition that transforms their ordinary environment with the magic of lamplit corners, mirrors, and rich shadows. We are immediately taken into the women’s secret world as they hide together.
Domestic and small sensory details bring us closely into the characters’ lives through their small gestures, touches, intimacy of hands, bodies, clothing.
The story is grounded in Nina and Madeleine’s profound attachment, their sudden and shocking separation, and their fight to stay connected to each other against overwhelming odds.
Meneghetti offers an economy of storytelling, showing us just enough so we enter the story ourselves. This is his first feature, premiering at Toronto International Film Festival as part of the Discovery program. It is intelligent filmmaking, deserving of its place as France’s official entry for Best International Film for the 93rd Academy Awards.
Early in the story we learn the lovers are nurturing a plan to leave the country, to find a place to live in Rome, the city where they first met.
“With new friends we can be who we want,” says Madeleine.
In spite of this assertion Madeleine’s cherished dream falters because of her loyalty to her family. We discover that her marriage was unhappy but still her sense of responsibility to her children and grandchild blocks her seeking the freedom of her own life.
Having waited for years to live their relationship openly, having giving up her own life to live in a parochial town so she can be close to her lover, Nina is furious at Madeleine’s failure of nerve.
“Do you have a problem with old dykes?” Nina shouts at a bemused passerby in one of Sukowa’s many great moments as she fights for her dream with sometimes shocking ferocity.
Sukowa has been an emotional and physical force onscreen since her film breakthroughs with Fassbinder’s Berlin Alexanderplatz (1980) and Lola (1981), and her award-winning turn in Rosa Luxembourg (1986).
Her powerful screen presence is complemented by Chevalier’s more interior, delicate playing of the conflicted Madeleine. The older woman’s responsibility to societal demands is a frustrating dilemma that creates a terrific holding point for us to reflect on many profound themes. There is the desperation of missing out on your own life, a sharp look at how the balance of power can shift from ageing parents to their children, and the prevalence of homophobic prejudice and insecurities. It’s a smart choice to locate the story in a small, conservative Catholic town rather than a more diverse city.
In an interview with Awards Daily, Menghetti spoke of being inspired by the current climate for the LGBTQ population.
“When we were writing the script, there were gatherings so they could pass what is called ‘Marriage for Everybody.’ There were one hundred thousand people in Paris coming from the south and all over just to say no. That really mattered to us while writing because it was motivating. You realise that we are dealing with something that is very much there and it can go backwards easily.”
A great feature of the narrative is Meneghetti’s skilful shifts in point of view. We focus first on Madeleine as she confronts the crippling reality of family expectation. Suddenly, we are following Nina as the hide and seek game takes on a terrible turn. The tension reaches breaking point with Nina’s desperation to connect with her lover when their relationship is still a taboo secret.
There is a moment when Nina’s ruthless actions test the audience’s empathy and threatens to backfire. These risky unexpected turns mean we can never be sure how this will resolve, and keeps us guessing until the end.
This is deft storytelling where key elements of the backstory get filled in during the last act, adding a wonderful propulsion to the story, and injecting it with even more drama and significance.
When we shift to the prejudiced daughter’s’ point of view – an uncomfortably transparent performance by Lea Drucker in another excellent casting choice – the story just gets richer as we glimpse another side in the complex emotional drama.
Each character is tested to the max, and we are gripped by suspense at every unpredictable turn. What action will they take, can they grow, or will they break?
Menghetti adds in a couple of wild card characters like the caregiver, in a sly performance by Muriel Bénazér. She is hired to look after the now dependent Madeleine, blocking Nina’s access and pushing her own agenda. There’s also Madeleine’s son who could offer support but is too surly and embittered. The young grandson is also a great addition; the moments of affectionate connection with his grandmother bind her even more to family, at a terrible cost to herself.
A strength of the film is that the one constant is the women’s love for each other. That unshakeable fact acts as a searing catalyst on everyone’s lives and confronts the ugliness of societal prejudice.
Meneghetti is younger than the women at the center of his film, but he offers strength and respect to support his actors. It’s more than refreshing to see such real faces and raw, brave performances.
In an interview with Festival Pro he says, “We live in a society that’s still obsessed with youth… sometimes you are watching a film, and even a baker has a six-pack. It’s a political issue, and as a director, I have a responsibility to be honest, without showing every single wrinkle.”
Two Of Us is in cinemas May 20, 2021
