Jeremy: A Review

Not often do all the elements of a film – the screenplay, the cast, the cinematography, the music, the production design, and the editing – come together in perfect harmony in as short as half an hour, and deliver an emotionally powerful experience that renews faith in the art of cinema. Yet, such a result can be found in many frames of Brian Faye’s 31-minute film Jeremy, which is the rare visualization of spiritual alienation and the importance of faith.

Jeremy is quite a cinematic gem that, at one point, follows a fairly straightforward yet well-trodden narrative to a simple conclusion and, at another, indulges in a shred of tightly-woven plot lines to transform a monotonous story into something of a spiritual revelation beyond its conventional storyline. The artistic maturity and mastery of Faye for his cinematic aptitude to utterly captivate audience and shine new light on the universal aspects of faith is enormous. A conventional character study or religion-themed melodrama would spend the majority of time and plot on the architecture of its storyline. What distinguishes Jeremy from that is its axis of drama being defined not by plots, but by the main character’s psychological development and emotional growth toward maturity – a coming-of-age story hold in deceptively fast pace.

Moreover, Jeremy represents an unmarked film genre that sets out to construct a world of its own. Although the film’s obvious reliance on the aesthetic spirit of any American independent film makes its relationship with the independent or art-house genre stereotypically labeled, it is its unique spiritual sympathy and depth with which the motif of Jeremy is fully explored, which nevertheless produces much of its powerful impact. Indeed a film like Jeremy has very little to do with genre because the context and nuance provided by the story suggest a freeness of style throughout the film. Thus, it is an independent film in all meaningful perspectives.

The film tells the inspiring story of Jeremy, who, when his incarcerated father is transferred to a distant prison, begins a new, lonesome, “fatherless” life with his game show-addicted mother and two violent half-brothers. Constantly disappointed by the mistreat of his half-brothers and by the unfulfilled promises made by his mother’s boyfriend – the only possible father-figure in his life, and breathlessly trapped in the bleakest trailer park in western Texas most of his life, Jeremy finally stops his search for happiness in the household, and begins to find spiritual enlightenment in the Bible and in a local church. The choice of his costs him repeated mockeries and ridicules from the half-brothers and the money to buy him new clothes from his mother. In a tranquil yet desolate landscape and atmosphere, Jeremy’s life is about to change all for the good, as he scours heaven and earth for love and light, the kind that he desperately craves.

Faye wrote Jeremy too, and it is a masterful and lyrical screenplay, with sparse yet authentic dialogues. At the center of the story is a mounting yearning for spiritual enrichment, not being directly told to the audience, but instead unfolding with very unhurried grace, which beautifully captures the rhythm of the deprived rural setting like poetry offering respite from its bleakness and gleaming smoothly. There are many sophisticated literary elements scattered in Jeremy: the isolation of the rurality, the cruelty of the living, the loneliness of the boy, all make possible the kind of faith that overwhelms the protagonist and renders itself not only explicable but indeed satisfying.

Furthermore, Jeremy is a profoundly beautiful piece of cinema. Faye has brought something visually enchanting and compelling onto the screen; his efforts here are nothing less than stellar. Jeremy’s emotional anguish and turmoil are visually stylized and indeed accentuated through desaturated yet breathtaking color cinematography. Ian Coad’s camera stunningly evokes the serene stillness and the sprawling and exhilarating beauty of America’s western landscapes; his sensitive vision becomes a photographic grandeur that almost reduces the film’s already simple storyline to a universe of simplicity of scenery and emotion, which overpower the story. Hence, Jeremy quietly delivers an unforgiving reality with glooms, and ultimately, gleams.

Nonetheless, Jeremy produces a magnificent ambience through its sound effect. The exquisite score subtly underplays the frames of actions occurring on the screen, never invasive but always contextually illuminating. Since the film’s narrative corpus is of conflict and convergence, agony and resolution, the story is perfectly set against a reflective score; the score breezes in and out of the film, creating a gentle, calming mood over the scenes it accompanies. Sung solely by a piano, the music in this film, although used minimally and sparingly, works advantageously.

All in all, Jeremy is a particularly finely made short film by a student-filmmaker. Through the power of its minimalist story, the intensity of its sentimentalism, and the deeply touching interpretations of the characters by the actors involved, it is of deep awareness to every important details and every profound themes. Despite its manifest simplicity and obvious brevity, Jeremy is a work of depth and clarity, a work of art, and therefore an essential viewing.

Postscript: Jeremy won “Best Acting” (Dalton O’Dell, who played Jeremy) last week at the Bend Film Festival in Oregon (http://www.bendfilm.org/2010-films/2010-winners/). In September, the film competed with nearly 500 films and won the Angelus Student Film Festival “Triumph of the Spirit Award” in Hollywood (http://angelus.org/winners-current.html). At present, the film is screening at the Heartland Film Festival in Indiana (http://www.trulymovingpictures.org/festival-years/2010/movie/jeremy).