Rating: 4.5/5
Criterion Challenge 2022 | 37/52 | Out at Criterion: LGBTQ films
Wherever the bird with no feet flew, she found trees with no limbs. — Audre Lorde
Seventeen-year-old Alike, or Lee as she goes by, stands in a strip club with her friend Laura, watching a beautiful woman slide down the pole. Laura throws bills at the woman while Lee stands there, mouth agape. Cut to another club, where Lee sits on a couch alone. She checks the time and grabs Laura, dancing with a woman. Outside, Laura presses on Lee why she’s still a virgin and hasn’t found herself a girl yet. It looks like a friend razzing a friend, but Lee feels the disconnect between the reality of this night and her life at home.
On the bus, Laura tries to ride with Lee to her place, but Lee forces her to get off at her stop. With Laura gone, Lee strips off her cap and polo, putting them in her camo bag. Underneath, she wears a woman’s tee. She puts her earrings in before stepping into her house. Her mother, Audrey, asks Lee where she’s been, her curfew being 12:30. She also complements the tee Audrey is wearing, saying it “compliments her figure.” When Lee dismisses the compliment, Audrey reminds Lee that she doesn’t like Laura.
The next day, when Lee gets to school, she changes out of the femme clothes she left the house in, donning a tank top, cap, and baggy tee. During lunch, she takes the cafeteria food to Mrs. Alvarado’s classroom. Lee shows the English teacher her poems. Mrs. Alvarado is meh on the poems—beautiful, but she knows Lee can go deeper.
After church one day, Audrey introduces Lee to the daughter of a church friend—a girl named Bina. The film follows Lee as she spends more time with Bina and develops feelings for her.
— I don't know what you think this is going to change. — I know God doesn't make mistakes.
The filmmaking is economical, not wasting a moment on anything that doesn’t tell us more about Lee and her family. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have artistic flourishes, though. The first time we meet Alike, in the strip club, we see the stripper sliding head first down the pole. When the camera cuts to Alike, it is spinning around to look at her right-side up, a natural smile on her face. Her face is lit in a soft teal, and the world around her is a rich magenta.
The camera has rapid attention, moving from person to person, like the eyes of someone trying to assess who and what is safe in their environment. Some people get less than a second—all the time needed to catch a vibe or dismiss it outright. This tension increases at home when Lee must suppress herself furthest.
Audrey’s staunch Christian mindset makes her tense around other people. In the same way that Lee doesn’t feel she can express herself authentically, Audrey sees herself the same way. Meanwhile, while strict in one sense, Lee’s father, Arthur, is more laid back with Lee. The two can go out and play basketball, and Arther will treat her like one of the guys, razzing and all. But he’s still a father and still has the same gender expectations of his daughter as Audrey does. Audrey and Arthur’s relationship is rocky and complicated.
I loved watching Alike and Bina’s relationship develop organically. It captures that teenage relationship universal of shared music taste, awkwardness, and terrible communication.
The last 20 minutes are fucking rough, dude! It’s not like “bury your gays” rough, just a rich emotional palette at work.