Page 30 - ARUBA TODAY

A30 PEOPLE & ARTS
Wednesday 11 March 2020
Review: Unease of girlhood shines

through in ‘Never Rarely’

By LINDSEY BAHR harassment, general hostil- think of “Never Rarely
Associated Press ity, or the even that gray Sometimes Always” as sim-
The teenage girls at the area where the interaction ply an abortion drama. This
center of “ Never Rarely might qualify as socially is a film about class and
Sometimes Always ” don’t acceptable but still leaves gender and femaleness
have the luxury of being someone feeling uncom- and youth and unwanted
carefree. Granted, things fortable. This is, of course, a attention that makes the
are a little complicated little overly simplistic, but it smallest moments come
at the moment we enter serves the film well in show- alive with humanity. Rarely
their lives: 17-year-old Au- ing the daily discomfort of has a filmmaker ever given
This image released by Focus Features shows Sidney Flanigan in tumn (newcomer Sidney merely existing publicly in so much care to show the
a scene from "Never Rarely Sometimes Always." Flanigan) is pregnant and the body of a teenage girl. everyday awkwardness
Associated Press
doesn’t want to be any- Add to that an unwanted and subtle humiliations of
more. But you get the sense pregnancy and the fact of being a woman, from the
that neither Autumn nor her life in a rural Pennsylvania minor things (like adjusting
cousin Skylar (Talia Ryder, town where abortion isn’t a bra strap) to the major.
also a newcomer) have an option and you start to The girls navigate subways,
been able to relax, fully, for get a sense of why neither bureaucracies and even
quite some time, but defi- Autumn nor Skylar have karaoke rooms and bowl-
nitely not since puberty hit. much reason to smile. Not ing alleys with the fortitude
The world of writer and di- that anyone asks them to, of warriors. Both Flanigan
rector Eliza Hittman’s film that would be too cheap a and Ryder should have Hol-
is an uneasy one for a shot for a film this thought- lywood clamoring for them
girl. We meet Autumn at ful. Autumn attempts to after this film.
a school talent show. Ev- get help near home, but This is an easy film to get
eryone else is performing realizes eventually that the swept up in, but there is one
goofy, fun acts in groups, women in her town are not scene that stands above
but she stands on the stage exactly supportive of her all the others in its mastery
alone with her voice and decision. And so in order and it’s the one that the ti-
her guitar and sings a song to have a choice she and tle is derived from. Autumn
of heartache and loneli- Skylar board a bus to New doesn’t have the luxury of
ness. A boy in the audi- York, where things don’t letting her guard down for
ence yells out “slut.” It’s get any easier. The first most of the movie, but in
shocking but also not and clinic they try won’t termi- this scene a warm and se-
Autumn merely continues nate past a certain point rious woman at the clinic
with her song. She doesn’t in the pregnancy. The next asks Autumn a series of
have many choices in the option won’t be open un- questions that you sense
moment, but “ignore and til the following day and she has never even dared
move on” seems to be her Autumn and Skyler, not ask herself. Her face fills the
default mode of coping. having enough money to frame, masking the emo-
Over the course of the film spend on a hotel, are only tion until she can’t contain
there is quite literally not able to wander the cold, it anymore. It’s cathartic
a single man who isn’t a wet and uninviting city until and devastating to see her
threat to the girls in some morning. finally get the attention she
way, whether through overt It would be reductive to actually needs.q

Review: New NUMA Files story is a

nonstop thrill ride

By JEFF AYERS actually related, and an
Associated Press act of kindness to rescue
“Journey of the Pharaohs,” the men on the vessel that
Putnam, by Clive Cussler is sinking throws Kurt Austin
and Graham Brown and his partner and best
In 1074 B.C., an Egyptian friend, Joe Zavala, into a
fleet heads out to sea and deadly conspiracy.
vanishes from sight and The doomed ship was car-
history. In 1927, a pilot at- rying an item of historical
tempting to make a trans- significance, and when
continental flight disap- Austin recovers it, he learns
pears. And in the present, that it is part of an ancient
a boat sinks with a secret Egyptian artifact with hi-
cargo in the Clive Cussler eroglyphics that tell part
and Graham Brown nov- of a story of Herihor, a mili- This cover image released
el “Journey of the Pha- tary commander who rose by Putnam shows "Journey
raohs.” In typical Cussler to prominence and be- of the Pharaohs," a novel by
Clive Cussler and Graham
fashion, the three seem- come a pharaoh but has Brown.
ingly disparate events are been largely forgotten.q Associated Press