In recent years, office-centric films have started looking gloomier than in the past. Just look at Kitty Green’s “The Assistant” or Rachel Lambert’s “Sometimes I Think About Dying,” and you’ll see more greyish colder tones dominating their color palette. Beyond the visual distinction, the films have also been thematically gloomier. Much like Rachel Lambert’s 2023 film, Naomi Jaye’s “Darkest Miriam” finds a woman stuck in the monotony of her workplace, lonely and unable to find an escape or a moment of pure joy. The loneliness adds to their misery.
Unlike Daisy Ridley’s character, Brit Lower’s Miriam is not caught in between the corners of a cubicle. She works at a branch of the public library in Canada, where she deals with people living on the fringes on a daily basis. These eccentric patrons maintain the illusion of liveliness in her otherwise lonesome life. When asked about her personal life, Miriam claims that her father died, even though she doesn’t even know if it’s true. One day, he just disappeared from her life. So, she finds it easier to lie rather than share the truth.
Although Miriam is sociable, she has no one to call her own. While yearning for love or someone to love, she suddenly finds it in two forms. One is an obsessive library visitor who writes secret letters threatening her to accept his love. The other is a foreign cab driver, Yanko (Tom Mercier), who remains lost in his solitude. During her lunch break, Miriam notices him reading and eating lunch by himself like she does. After a brief conversation, they start finding comfort in each other’s presence. Over time, they share most of their days together – fulfilling each other’s desire for company.
While experiencing the joy of his love, Miriam remains worried about the mystery guy, who keeps writing one letter after another, conveying his passive-aggressive obsession for her, masquerading as love. In one or the other form, fear surrounds her. She remains engulfed in a never-ending state of despair. Amidst this, Yanko shows his abstract paintings that act as a form of expression for his inexplicable thoughts. Despite having an uneventful life, he shares all that he encounters while driving strangers through his cab. On the other hand, Miriam struggles to be truthful about herself. Although she reads out the fictional stories, she refuses to tell hers.
Be it stories, poems, or artworks, “Darkest Miriam” explores the significance of expression in the lives of its isolated characters. It delves into the different roots behind their isolation. For Yanko, it is due to the eternal feeling of foreignness in a land that doesn’t fully accept him. Miriam’s father had a fair share of afflictions that led him to choose isolation. For Miriam, it is a result of feeling rejection that led to her self-imposed, almost-stoic seclusion. No matter how they experience it, their need for expression keeps them intrinsically connected.
The film finds a thread of humanity between all its characters, trying to form some sort of connection. A patron, worried about his brother’s violent impulses, seeks Miriam’s library as a shelter. Meanwhile, the other patrons battle their feelings of unwantedness through an antic or a tantrum. The letter writer also expects some form of attention. The script builds a web of people’s emotional needs and struggles to be met through books, poems, or people.
The film builds a gorgeous arc of romance between Yanko and Miriam, who express their desires in imaginative ways. It understands the value of their fantastical, rich inner lives to their coexistence and codependence. Through evocative transitions, the film’s editing brings a sense of poeticism to accentuate the film’s moodiness and mild absurdity. It brings out Miriam’s feelings of loss, grief, and despair without any preachiness.
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