Cannes 2022: The first-time filmmaker poignantly captures the passage of time as it affects both parents and children
Early on during the vacation that Calum (Paul Mescal, “The Lost Daughter”) and his daughter Sophie (Frankie Corio) take to a Turkish beach resort in “Aftersun” — the heart-achingly stirring and sensorially entrancing debut feature from writer-director Charlotte Wells, set in the 1990s — a brief encounter exposes the film’s profoundly relatable thesis. As father and child ready themselves for a game of pool, two teenage boys approach them under the impression that the pair are siblings. Once they learn he’s not a brother but a parent, their demeanor changes. Calum immediately becomes a figure of authority. They watch their language around him and treat him with an air of respect. In their defense, Mescal’s boyish features and playful aura would deceive most, but their reaction exemplifies our collective inability to see those who raise us as individuals beyond the guardian roles they have assumed. In these kids’ perception, and at first in Sophie’s as well, Calum doesn’t exist in the same plane as them. He’s “old,” even if he’s not. Wells opens this ode to vivid memory, which yields a fair share of unassuming epiphanies, with the distinctive mechanical sound of a rewinding tape in the family’s camcorder — a rewinding of time itself. The MiniDV footage starts just as cheeky but sensible 11-year-old Sophie teases Calum about turning 31, a young father adrift but trying to project stability for her sake. These recorded clips of isolated candid interactions tell only part of the tale. That Sophie lives with her mother in Scotland, while Calum resides in London with no plans of moving back, means this holiday and the mental souvenirs derived from it matter gravely. Lean exposition comes in small doses offering only details relevant to this relationship, relying more on the effervescent chemistry between the two leads, whether lounging by the pool or during casual conversations that turn revelatory. As an aesthetically innovative touch, Wells introduces shots that unfold in a dreamlike space, like a crowded concert venue that we observe only in flashes of light, where adult Sophie (Celia Rowlson-Hall, “Vox Lux”) sees her father, still as a young man, from afar.
