~ Kate Bonner

I’m new to Nelson. I recently moved here to go back to school and enjoy a life away from the speed a larger city seems to push a person into.   I don’t know many people so I’ve been frequently the movie theatre for some much needed entertainment and to get out of the house.  I must say, I am really impressed with the Nelson Civic Theatre!  The space is well utilized, very comfortable and there are some great events coming up.  This brings me to the latest film I have seen at the Nelson Civic Theatre.  

The Tribe.

Honestly, I had no clue what I was getting myself into.  I did a bit of research into the story and found that most of the reviews were positive and it racked up quite the list of independent film awards.   The most obvious detail (and what some critics are calling a gimmick) is the entire cast is deaf.  There are no subtitles, score or audible dialogue. The only communication is through Ukrainian sign language, facial expressions and body language. The only sound comes from human interaction with their surroundings.  Snow crunching, skin on skin and soft traffic noise in the background.  This really piqued my interest.  

I half way expected to be so moved by being forced to interpret the story though my visual senses only, that I would  be able to blabber on and on about my experience.  I made one huge mistake in my assumption…I forgot to account for a non-westernized foreign film’s strength in bringing to light the gritty reality a lot of people live in.  A reality that does not include the censored version we watch so often.  Most westernized stories are manipulated to have a good guy, a bad guy and a satisfying resolution that allows for the perfect amount of closure.  The character always accomplishes something; be it revenge, the perfect love found, success, understanding, overcoming adversity or learning something.  The Tribe does not deliver any of this.  It is a real slice of life experience following our protagonist whose name you learn only in the credits.  Sergey.  He is a deaf young man who is new to a boarding school for the hearing impaired.  He is bullied, hazed then forcibly initiated into a tribe of teenaged boys at his school.  He quickly learns his acceptance is conditional and dependent on his going with the grain of the group.  The moment he makes an independent choice, he is cast out and he learns firsthand the extremes his friends go to and real brutality he has adopted through his peers.  

I don’t want to list all the shocking experiences Sergey and his friends’ experience.  It’ll ruin the natural flow of the film for its potential viewers.  Because this film was shot in 34 frames, each scene is long and intensely builds tension.  Because of this, I was mentally and physically immobilized in my seat.  I was so enraptured trying to visually understand the story line and communication between the characters, I had no room left to emotionally react to any of it.  I am usually a fairly emotional person.  I cry if I look at my dogs faces for too long and think about how much I love them.  I cry when someone is nice to me after a bad day.  I cry when I accomplish something, I cry when I’m frustrated and I cry when I’m happy…the moral of this diatribe is, I am easily a very emotionally reactionary person in what I hope is just an empathetic way and not some sort of hormone imbalance.   The Tribe made me feel frozen, immobilized, trapped, and unable to connect with any of the characters.   I think that was the intention of the writer/director.  It felt very deliberate, but not obvious. I think it was a fantastically alienating way to force the viewer into experiencing what the characters were going through.  Their inability to hear wasn’t the issue…their desperation and life experiences were being perpetuated instead of used to overcome adversity.  Maybe taking away one of the audience’s senses was the only way to distract our minds from being able to tap into our emotions.  Maybe it was a way to eliminate the viewers’ natural need to sympathize with the protagonist.  The distraction of struggling to understand the dialogue really changed my mental state and made me less vulnerable to scenes that would normally kick me in the feels.

I read a lot of reviewers that didn’t like the “gimmick” used by the director.  They thought it was pointless to have no audible form of communication and force the audience to sit in silence trying to keep up. It wasn’t hard to figure out what was happening or being said but it was overwhelming.  It gave only a fraction of an idea of what it must feel like to be deaf and try to communicate with those who don’t sign.

There was a lot of violence, nudity, sexual content, and disturbing situations.  I struggled to watch a few scenes and thanks to absolutely no soundtrack, I could hear other audience members struggling to sit still, some gasps and a couple people leaving due to one of the many trying scenes.  It might have added to the experience…a sort of control group experiment in audience participation.  Maybe I’m over thinking the directors intention.

After the film ended I sat in my seat wondering what the bejesus I just watched.  Oddly enough, I left the theatre with a very distinct ringing in my ears and a similar feeling of emptiness Sergey displayed in his final scene.  It wasn’t empathy, it wasn’t sadness…it was just nothing.

I enjoy film of all sorts.  I like to laugh, cry, watch action, feel suspense, and fear you can feel through the escape of a good movie.  I also like slice of life films that leave you feeling something other than placated.  Through The Tribe, I experienced discomfort, sadness, confusion and a hard dose of someone’s unglamorous reality.  I recommend it to those who appreciate the unusual and who have an open mine to new experiences.  I don’t want to underplay the serious content, but it was necessary to flesh out the character development and give the viewer a good visual understanding of the severe reality the characters live in.  

Keep an eye out for the interesting films Nelson Civic Theatre will be bringing in over the next few months.  I have been enjoying films I wouldn’t normally gravitate towards hoping to get outside my own comfort zone.  I highly recommend it!

Kate Bonner loves dogs, spends most of her time feeling awkward and trying not to get sunburned.