There’s great tenderness and warmth of pure, unadulterated understanding in Dominic Savage’s directorial, Close to You, which extends to its protagonist. A marginal identity is at the very heart of the narrative, demanding sensitivity, intimate attention, and a caring, non-judgemental gaze. But the film also has to ensure the attempts at offering dignity and agency to its protagonist aren’t some overly cloying gestures dripping with merely righteous do-goody impulses. There must be kindling traces of fierce emotional heat.
The film has sparks of honesty, but the explosiveness goes amiss in places, replaced by a tone that feels more affected. It frequently refers to merely relying on its impeccable intentions to craft scenes like a key argument that serves to underline the constant strain imposed on one to remain true to one’s identity. Casual antagonism and condescension will continue to be a daily battle in one’s existence, even if one finds some previously tough, unhospitable corners to have relaxed and opened up. It never gets wholly easy and smooth and pleasingly amenable. There will always be a certain share of steady eyebrow-raising and insinuations no matter how far one has gone down the road in their journey of asserting identity. It seems like an inviolable part of the journey.
In his first film role since his coming out as a trans man, Elliot Page infuses so much ache and singular burning emotion into the telling that no matter its jadedness, it springs ultimately as raw and acute and full of intensely felt sensations. Page pours his heart and soul into the film, rescuing a clutch of otherwise stagey scenes from lapsing into artificially contrived circumstances designed to buttress inevitable conflict and hurt. His performance is the central, unifying reason behind the film landing its emotional stabs. The story is fairly simple and conventional—Page essays Sam, who finally decides to join his father’s birthday celebration.
He lives on his own in a tiny room in Toronto, sharing a friend’s place. It might not be a great arrangement, but he insists he is happy and has peace of mind. He hasn’t been home in over five years, choosing to stay away because his family might have accepted his new identity, but their approach to him still retains a touch of overworked great efforts. He tells his friend how he feels his family expects some gold medals for accepting him and would proudly wave around their unimpeachable credentials for the same as if it’s some feat they have accomplished. That’s what pisses him off.
Nevertheless, he agrees to go this time. On the way, he meets his childhood best friend, Katherine (Hillary Baack). She’s married now with two kids and works at a café. Her life is determinedly different from his, yet she understands him with all-encompassing love and regard. That both still yearn for each other is immediately evident, and it’s a marvel to watch Baack and Page dial up the vulnerability and tentativeness. Though Katherine barely emerges as a discrete character in her own right, Baack brings in an enormity of emotional openness and transparency.
At the birthday gathering, Sam has to reassure everyone that he’s doing well and he’s emotionally in a far better place than before. “You weren’t worrying when I wasn’t actually okay,” he hits back. His parents and sisters express genuine happiness beneath all the layers of concern for him. But when his brother-in-law, Paul (David Reale), unleashes a transphobic comment about rules to obey and things to keep in mind for conversing with him, it unleashes in him a tide of backlash and fury. Sam is fully past being accommodating of so-called slip-ups and lapses. All he needs is some appreciation of his existence. Is that such a tall order?
However, these scenes strike as heavily commonplace and starkly uninspired despite the fervor Page brings to the table. Even Sam’s eventual trajectory with Katherine comes off as hurriedly etched and dutifully aided by overly evocative, hollow music. The growth of this relationship in the wake of time’s changes feels too rushed to have its impact wholly felt. As a result, the emotional uncorking that Sam experiences throughout the film veers to being diluted to a considerable extent. Neither do the final moments persuasively pull off a sense of breather that the character feels. It is a shame because Page is truly exceptional in the film, more earnest and heartfelt than it.
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