GLASGOW FILM FESTIVAL
Ewan Mcgregor teams up with real-life daughter Clara Mcgregor in Bleeding Love (JJ), a by-thenumbers American indie road movie about an estranged father attempting to repair his relationship with his 20-year-old kid when the latter overdoses. Joining this tentative father-daughter team on the road hours after this unseen incident, the film – which plays Glasgow Film Festival this weekend – provides a decent showcase for Mcgregor Snr’s recent facility for playing haunted middle-aged men damaged by addiction (outside of Trainspotting and Young Adam, his best film performance by far has been as the grown-up Danny Torrence in The Shining sequel Doctor Sleep).
His character here is reckoning with the impact his now undercontrol alcoholism has had on the daughter he abandoned as a preteen, with Mcgregor (retaining his Scottish accent for once) bringing a quiet, lived-in authority to his part that the film around him struggles to match. That’s partly because Clara Mcgregor, who co-wrote the script and also serves as one of its producers, doesn’t have the chops to pull off the role. Her performance tends to towards the histrionic, ensuring that director Emma Westenberg’s look at the ravages of addiction never really convinces.
A far better US indie is to be found in The G (JJJJ), which provides a rare leading role for veteran character actor Dale Dickey, better known for supplying grizzled, colourful support in hard-bitten neo-noirs and neo
westerns like Winter’s Bone and Hell or High Water. Here she plays a badass grandma ensnared in America’s Kafka-esque healthcare system after a court-appointed guardian targets her and her crippled husband for enforced residential care. It’s an entirely legal scam that exploits society’s indifference to the elderly, but Dickey’s Ann, affectionately known as the titular “G” by her selfesteem-challenged granddaughter (Romane Denis), has a dark and violent past that she’s only too willing to dredge up to take revenge on the people who’ve put her in this situation. Writer/director Karl R Hearne’s stripped-down approach makes for a gnarly ride, but it’s Dickey’s formidable performance that makes it work so well.
Also good is The Teachers’ Lounge (JJJJ). Oscar-nominated for best international feature, this German film revolves around an idealistic young teacher who rashly betrays her own principles in an effort to exonerate an immigrant student falsely accused of stealing. What follows is horribly compelling, bringing to mind Michael Haneke, not just in the casting of The White Ribbon’s Leonie Benesch in the lead, but also in the queasy atmosphere of dread that courses through this allegorical thriller.
Co-writer/director Ilker Çatak keeps everything rooted in reality, with every move Benesch’s Carla makes to right a situation that’s spiralling out her control backfiring in plausibly enraging ways, sabotaged by petty grievances between the staff, as well as the unpredictable behaviour of the students as they attempt to navigate a world full of conflicting advice from grown-ups. Eschewing the cosy, reassuring tropes of the typical inspirational teacher movie, this is a far more worthwhile drama about the true grit required to succeed in this toughest of occupations.