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| Eylul Guven in Blue Heron |
Cast: Eylul Guven, Edik Beddoes, Iringó Réti, Ádám Tompa, Liam Serg, Preston Drabble, Amy Zimmer. Screenplay: Sophy Romvari. Cinematography: Maya Bankovic. Production design: Victoria Furuya. Film editing: Kurt Walker.
"Mental illness," "neurodivergence," "social dysfunction," there are many phrases and labels that can be applied to the case of Jeremy (Edik Beddoes), the central character in Sophy Romvari's debut feature Blue Heron. And perhaps the problem is that Jeremy is a "case," a subject for study and analysis, which his desperate parents resort to when their oldest child threatens the peace and stability of the family. Unfortunately, the parents and their three younger children have to live with Jeremy's disruption while the psychologists and social workers can only maintain a clinical distance. Romvari tells the story largely through the eyes of the youngest member of the family, Sasha, first as a child (Eylul Guven) and then as an adult (Amy Zimmer), trying to reconstruct their experience twenty years later. Romvari intelligently and artfully bends time, sending the adult Sasha back to scenes from her childhood, putting her in the place of a social worker trying to help the family cope. It's a film full of insights, but not of answers to the plight of families like the one it depicts, well-meaning and loving but driven to the frustrating limits in their attempt to cope. It's a well-written, well-staged, well-acted cry for help.
