Sundown (2022) — Read Along
Tim Roth at his laconic, existential best
“Sundown” is director Michel Franco’s 7th directorial stint behind the camera, and a strange one it is too with much to admire. No spoilers here, as ever, but here’s a brief capsule review to hopefully whet your appetite to see this intriguing film, or indeed see it again:
An apparently wealthy English family are enjoying an ultra luxurious holiday on the clifftops overlooking Acapulco and are in the very lap of luxury with their own private apartment, clifftop swimming pool and the very opposite of the bustling seaside metropolis below. An unexpected death in the family ends their holiday abruptly but a lost passport means the Patriarch of the family has to remain behind and in keeping with his developing character on screen, he takes up residence in the busy local streets of Acapulco rather than the luxury world just minutes away. Cloaked in anonymity and wrapped up within his own existential thoughts, is he experiencing a mid-life crisis, unable to comprehend the familial death he’s running away from, or is it far, far worse?
Ostensibly a five-hander with Albertine Kotting McMillan and Samuel Bottomley portraying the family’s teenage children “Alexa” and “Colin” respectively, as well as Iazua Larios brilliantly bringing to life local shop owner “Berenice”, your two main Marquee stars are as follows:
“Neil Bennett” (Tim Roth). It’s been nearly three decades now since Tim Roth lay bloodied and barely clinging onto life in Quentin Tarantino’s cinematic debut film “Reservoir Dogs” and with his continuing connection with the genius filmmaker ever since it’s been easy to keep track of his often underappreciated masterful pieces of acting. “Sundown” is his third collaboration with director Michel Franco and this is Roth’s film as he’s always front and centre and barely off screen. In a quiet and laconic performance, the theme is set from the very first frame of the film until well over 5 minutes into this 82 minute existential drama. Roth’s character is central to everything that happens within the film’s first 5 minutes but never speaks. There are smiles and encouraging appreciation of his family but there are also, already, faraway wistful looks, deep thoughts and a listless, lifeless attitude.
A passport is lost, a return flight home missed, a mobile telephone is ignored and a seemingly carefree existence is embraced. There is an unexplained “condition” but there are so many instances of Roth’s character lost in his own thoughts, oblivious almost of his surroundings and appearing to simply be in his own world of existential angst, apathy and silently observing the world around him whilst ignoring the real world and real family that have now departed the luxury paradise he spurns for the down to earth reality of Acapulco. He appears to be a liar yet he also appears to be dancing and blurring the lines of reality and life, or perhaps a life lived and a new life to be reborn?
Tim Roth brings a somewhat unlikeable and frustrating character to life brilliantly. It’s an almost ethereal take of a life being lived by someone else.
“Alice Bennett” (Charlotte Gainsbourg). If I were to admit that I remember Charlotte primarily for 2009’s “Antichrist” as well as the laugh fest(s) that were “Melancholia” in 2011 and “Nymphomaniac” two years later, would that let you into more film knowledge about me than you rather wish you didn’t otherwise know?! Here, Charlotte is wonderful once again if in a hugely reduced role compared to her co-star above. Whereby Roth’s character of Neil is quiet and reserved away in his own world, Gainsbourg’s character is glued to a mobile telephone Neil is happy to ignore. A seeming workaholic who’s distracted from the unreal beauty that surrounds here, Alice is clearly unhappy even before the life changing family telephone call and seemingly riddled with seething anger and anxiety. Charlotte Gainsbourg brilliantly realises her distant character but never more so than in the brief and tender scene where she appreciates her brother simply being on holiday with the family with a gentle “thank you for coming”.
This film won’t be what you’re expecting after 20 minutes or 45 minutes and certainly not towards its denouement, and all credit to the actors noted above as well as director Michel Franco. I immediately believed the family to be the traditional and stereotypical nuclear one of two children and a husband and wife, and the reveal that this isn’t the case is perhaps a slight spoiler but only used here to highlight that it surprised me as well as brilliantly highlighting the already hugely apparent disconnect between the two adult roles. I, wrongly, assumed they were a separated or near divorce couple and I’ve only highlighted this again as a huge plus point for a film that has many through lines and one is very definitely disconnection, as well as everything not quite being as still and calm as the surface of an underlying turbulent life would like you to believe.
The film is an ode to life, perhaps death and certainly the reality of an unknown paradise that still has to deal with random shootings on a beach and armed police patrolling a would be beach side bliss. The rays of the sun are brilliantly used as segues between scenes as well as a prism perhaps for existential thoughts and the sometimes unreality of life. I’d argue that the director’s use of so many camera angles whereby he captures one of the two main stars headless or slightly out of shot chimes with a fractured unreality too, but it’s Tim Roth’s showcase of a quiet descent into existential apathy that shines like a setting sun on a masterful melancholic performance.
It’s a strange one!
But Roth is masterful if a little deliberately unlikeable.
Thanks for reading. I hope this message in a bottle in The Matrix finds you well, prospering, and the right way up in an upside down world.
Nice review. Sundown was great. If you get a chance you should check out the director's film New Order (2020), too. Works in a totally different mode, though, about a hypothetical violent counterrevolution in Mexico.