Gritty tale of a teen’s resilience

Actress shines in an affectingly understated performance, writes T’Cha Dunlevy

The camera pulled me in immediately. Canadian Wiebke von Carolsfeld (Stay, Marion Bridge) gets arrestingly close to her lead actress at the outset of The Saver. A series of hand-held shots, by cinematographer Stephanie Anne Weber Biron (Xavier Dolan’s J’ai tue ma mere), lend a gritty intimacy to these early scenes, enhanced by von Carolsfeld’s own self-consciously choppy editing.

There is an almost documentary feel to the images, which fits the raw subject matter.

Fern (striking newcomer Imajyn Cardinal) is an introverted teenager, living a lonely existence.

She’s an outcast at school, and spends evenings making dinner for her mom, who cleans people’s houses and is always working late.

When her mother (Michelle Thrush, Cardinal’s real mother) dies unexpectedly, Fern is thrust into a whole new set of circumstances.

Unwilling to get dragged into the child welfare system, she quits school and takes up her mother’s housecleaning jobs, where she comes across a book on how to become a millionaire. The key, she gleans, is simply to save a lot of money.

Fern lands other odd jobs — as a superintendent (for a building owner played by Fubar’s Paul Spence) and working in the kitchen of an African restaurant.

Along the way, she develops a series of stilted relationships: with restaurateur Hamidou (Hamidou Savadago); a cleaning client’s daughter (Stephanie Janusauskas); stern tenant Mrs. Coleville (Pascale Bussieres); a gruff young guy who helps her move (Alexandre Landry); and her estranged Uncle Jack (Brandon Oakes).

In refreshingly authentic Montreal style, languages and cultures are in a constant state of flux (Fern is aboriginal, though this is never made into a focal point of the story).

None of these interactions can erase Fern’s repressed trauma as she does what she can just to keep things afloat.

Cardinal shines in an affectingly understated performance, her solemn face at once not giving anything away and telling us everything we need to know.

Based on the novel of the same name by former Montrealer Edeet Ravel, von Carolsfeld’s screenplay received deserved nominations from the Canadian Screen Awards and the Writers Guild of Canada.

She doesn’t overdo it with expository dialogue or melodrama, but simply remains with her determined protagonist as she soldiers on in an increasingly untenable situation.

The Saver doesn’t offer easy answers, but rather a unique look at a resilient young woman in a tough situation.