Zooey (Sherman Lau, 2006)

Dir. Sherman Lau
Starring Sarah Louise Lilley, Xavier Jimenez

One of the great things about independent films is that they almost always are made by people who really care about the material. This is especially true with extremely low budget films, the kind that go to the Slamdance film festival instead of Sundance. Since there is little studio interference, the director usually has complete creative control and focus groups aren’t used to sap the film dry of anything controversial or interesting. All of this is true about Sherman Lau’s Zooey, a film made with intense affection for the main characters. The only problem is that it is mind bogglingly awful from start to finish.

Angel (Xavier Jimenez) is a runner for a drug dealer and Zooey (Sarah Louise Lilley) is a prostitute. They meet one day when Angel is running from some hoodlums after a deal went awry. Director Sherman Lau doesn’t seem too interested in showing how their romance developed. In an all too brief sequence of events, they eventually fall in love and get married. Both have dreams of better lives, but a variety of problems constantly keep them stuck in their dangerous dead-end careers.

There are a few things about the film that suggest Lau might have some future potential as a filmmaker. He utilizes an interesting filmmaking technique by having several fast forward sequences throughout the film that quickly get us through the mundane moments of everyday life, suggesting Lau is not interested in wasting time with boring exposition. These sequences are also effective at evoking the sense that the characters are constantly trying to run away from their current path in life.

Lau based the film on the story of two people he knew in real life, and it’s obvious he cared about them deeply. He fills every frame of the film with sensitivity, refusing to judge his characters for their professions. Unfortunately, Lau is not a skilled enough filmmaker to overcome the obvious lack of budget that he has here. He clearly has trouble figuring out how to properly stage a scene. An early scene where Angel ties two thugs’ shoes together so he can get away is laughably unrealistic. A later scene involving a shootout with cops avoids any sense of logic to make it through to the conclusion.

Lau’s writing could also use some work. There's a confusing subplot where Angel and Zooey take care of the son of one of Zooey's prostitute friends while she is away. In an unconvincing series of scenes they begin to care about the child. When his mother never returns, he is taken in by social services, but Zooey and Angel want to adopt him. Lau never bothers to explain how any of this makes sense, especially a scene where the agency tells them that their applications looked very good. It’s pretty hard to understand how they managed to accomplish that.

The performances are particularly weak. Sarah Louise Lilley is occasionally able to find some inner depth for Zooey, but the constant shouting scenes do the actress no favors, and she seems completely lost during her character’s drug induced hazes. Even worse is Xavier Jimenez who isn’t able to utter one convincing line in the entire film. His attempts to emote are painfully embarrassing. His wooden performance really detracts from any emotional resonance the film tries to create. Performances from minor character are equally bad, especially the stereotypical pimps and hookers that pop up throughout the film.

Sometimes amateurish performances can actually add to the realism of a film, particularly in gritty independent films. This has worked in the past with films like Down to the Bone or Sherrybaby, but Zooey is a blatantly sympathetic film that requires a deep emotional connection to the main characters. Lau and his actors are unable to help us make that connection, making the film almost completely empty of any real value. I don’t have a hard time believing that the real life characters this film was based on were decent individuals stuck in a miserable life, but Lau‘s film doesn‘t do them justice. As if their fate wasn’t already bad enough, they deserved a much better movie made about them.

Grade: D

Black Girl (Ousmane Sembene, 1966)

Dir. Ousmane Sembene
Starring Mbissine Therese Diop

Ousmane Sembene had a very interesting life before he began to direct movies. He was a Senegalese man drafted to fight for the free French forces in World War 2. Back home he got involved in the trade union movement. Participating in railroad strikes and protesting the French participation in Vietnam. He then became a novelist, using his experiences as inspiration for stories that could shed light on important issues for his people. Quickly realizing that his books would only reach a limited audience, he began work as a filmmaker as a way to reach the outside world. He would eventually be considered the premiere African filmmaker in the world, and his 2004 release Moolaade would receive international acclaim and even an American theatrical release. Almost 40 years earlier was the release of his first film Black Girl, a sincere but uneven depiction of the tragic consequences of racism and colonialism.

Black Girl is centered around Diouana (Mbissine Therese Diop), a young woman from a small town in Senegal who goes to work as a nanny for a rich French couple in Dakar. The couple moves to France and takes Diouana along with them. She initially has great dreams of the beauty of the French beaches and shops, but never gets a chance to visit them. The couple now expects Diouana to work as their servant instead of nanny. She begins to feel isolated and lonely as the harsh treatment increases throughout the story. The couple is only referred to as Mister and Mistress throughout the film and we never learn their names, suggesting a disconnect from the normal trappings of human relations and a parallel to slavery.

It's not hard to see that Membene was originally a novelist who graduated to film. In Black Girl, he utilizes constant narration to make his point, with very little dialogue throughout. Most of the plot developments are told to us by Diouana, even as we see them happening. Membene is not yet ready to trust the audience to grasp the inner thoughts of his characters. Instead of allowing the actress to express such thoughts through her acting, or utilizing more filmmaking techniques to advance plot points and thematic elements, he has Diouana tell us everything as if she is reading a book.

Unfortunately, Membene's narrative does not appropriately build to his conclusion. Mistress is certainly rude and most likely racist, but the things done to Diouana throughout the film are fairly tame compared to what we've seen and read in countless stories about the civil rights struggle in America. Mistress constantly scolds her, forces her to wear an apron, and lies to her about her expected duties. This is all certainly bad, but we are shown nothing that warrants the impending tragic conclusion. There isn't even a point where she is prevented from leaving the job. The film is likely more potent for those in the region, who will certainly have a stronger inherent anger about the colonialism and abuse suffered at the hands of the French. Such inherent anger will likely make the treatment of Diouana seem much worse.

A subplot involving a romance between Diouana and a man from Dakar is developed in a confusing, haphazard manner. Diouana keeps a photograph of the man throughout her stay in France, but the character isn't remotely developed. We only see bits and pieces of him, and hear what Diouana says about him in the narration. It's uncertain why Membene felt the need to include this romance in the film, since it doesn't add anything to the overall message of the film and the positive spin put on it actually detracts from the overall theme of Diouana's increasing despair.

It's impossible to doubt the sincerity of Membene. He is clearly angry about the treatment of his country by the French, and by the way that Africans are defined by the color of their skin. Unfortunately, there are only a handful of moments where he conveys that Diouana is treated as a racial object. The rest of the film it seems like she just has an excessively mean boss. Since the film only has a 56 minute running time, it feels like much more could have been included to support Membene’s arguments.

There is one beautiful running sequence throughout the film that shows Membene's inherent storytelling skill. There is an African mask that Diouana takes from her hometown and gives to her employers. It changes hands throughout the film, a constant reminder of her heritage. At the end, the mask is used as a reminder of what happened. Racism is one of the ugliest aspects of human nature, and as the mask chases down Diouana’s employer, it chases us down too, and reminds us of the horrors perpetuated in the name of racial subjugation. It’s the most effective aspect of Black Girl, and makes you wish the rest of the film had lived up to the power of that theme.

Grade: C+