Blue Heron review: A powerful, stunning debut feature
Blue Heron wasn’t on my radar but the positive word of mouth encouraged me to change that. I’m so glad I did because it’s now one of my favourite films of the year.
The semi-autobiographical story, written and directed by Sophy Romvari, follows a Hungarian immigrant family who have moved around a bunch but have now settled on Vancouver Island in Canada. It is told through the eyes of Sasha (Eylul Guven), who is basically a stand-in for Romvari. There is a cloud hanging over the family of six – the eldest son, Jeremy (Edik Beddoes), may have a personality disorder and her parents (Iringo Reti and Adam Tompa) don’t know what to do with him as he poses a danger to himself and his siblings.
Romvari, expanding on the themes of her 2020 short documentary Still Processing, uses a subtle documentary-style approach to tell the ’90s story. We intimately observe the family as they go about their daily life, and we see how Jeremy’s weird, destructive behaviours manifest themselves over time and become too much for the family to manage.
There is an unexpected time jump midway through the film that really took me out of the story and threw me off for quite a while. I didn’t like it at first because I wanted to stay with the family in the ’90s – I was invested in that story – but instead, Romvari jumps forward 20 years and follows the older Sasha (Amy Zimmer). She is now a filmmaker creating a project about her family using old camcorder footage and interviews with social work experts about how Jeremy should have been supported at the time.
The filmmaking style and tone change, and it becomes this strange memory piece where timelines merge and the lines between fact and fiction blur. It takes a while to get used to, but it all comes together beautifully in the end and pays off emotionally. It really stuck with me hours after the credits rolled.
What a stunning and powerful feature debut from Romvari, who mines her own memories for this poignant and deeply personal portrait of her childhood and its ramifications on her as an adult.
In cinemas now