Review: The Nightingale
Jennifer Kent is unafraid to start difficult discussions. She proved this by commenting on the struggle of motherhood in her feature debut The Babadook, and has taken things to a much darker level with her newest release that focuses on the horrors of colonization. The Nightingale is an austere period drama that washes away the romanticism that has been painted in our history books for far too long in an attempt to influence fiction with the grotesque truth.
The plot focuses on Clare (Aisling Franciosi), an Irish mother and wife who is purposely being kept in her powerless servant girl position by Lieutenant Hawkings of the British Army (Sam Claflin). Despite her constant request for her letter of recommendation, Hawking denies the family their freedom and takes advantage of his military status. He repeatedly assaults Clare sexually, even offering her body to other officers as if she isn’t even human. Though Clare is attempting to endure the awful actions of her oppressor, everything changes when her husband decides to get involved.
Clare wakes one morning to be reminded of certain tragic events brought on by the lieutenant and his men just before they left town. She rushes to tell the authorities but they disregard her accusations because of her criminal status. Enraged, Clare runs to the family horse and saddles her up to follow the men on their treacherous journey. Because it is 1825 and the forest is full of colonizing men and frigid weather, the other servants ask her to take a guide which she reluctantly agrees. This brings in Billy (Baykali Ganambarr), an Aboriginal local, who is commissioned for the trip.
The design of the film — the costumes and lighting mixed with the straight-forward camera movements — purposely accentuate the subject matter. The overall feeling is cold and distant as the bulk of the scenes are set in the color scheme of the muted gray of the sky and the dark brown of the earth. Hope feels out of reach as Clare and Billy camp out with their single sheet on the cold ground. This carefully curated reconstruction of the time period can be felt.
The film’s biggest strength is the point of view. As the camera bounces back and forth between Clare and the group of British soldiers, it captures the events a bit more objectively. This gives Lieutenant Hawkings and his crew screen time away from the general public and allows the audience to see more of the despicable control tactics that mimic the real behavior of British colonizers during this time in history. These men are nasty and rotten souls that use their positions to take care of their selfish urges before thinking about the human beings that are directly in front of them. While other films might mention how horrendous colonizers are through dialogue or storytelling, Kent uses cinematic language to show the viewer just how ruthless these male characters are.
The treatment of the Aboriginals during the British takeover of Australia was horrid in every way imaginable but, as I mentioned above, cinematic depiction of colonization is usually romanticized and called ‘exploration’ while making the Indigenous characters the villain. The Nightingale doesn’t put a rosy filter on anything. Kent allowed all the worst actions to not only be seen, but truly be experienced, giving the viewer a taste of what the objects of oppression went through during this time. This calls for some serious content warnings and careful consideration before a repeat viewing, but the material is necessary.
The Nightingale is an amazing film that I never want to watch again. The journey of Clare and Billy and the events they encounter are forever tattooed on my brain, reminding me that this kind of fictional story is based on true history. Of course, the controversy with The Nightingale is understandable: you cannot create radical cinema without outrage and I applaud Jennifer Kent for her achievement.
