Director: Andrew Haigh (UK, USA). Year of Release: 2023
A residential block in the middle of London. It’s more up-market than somewhere where you or I might live, and is fully soulless. A man stares at his laptop, seeking inspiration. A couple of times, he’s about to write something, but never quite gets there. After a while, he lies down on his sofa to fall asleep watching trashy telly. He is woken up by the smoke alarm, but when he goes down to the designated area, he is alone. He looks up at the block. Only one of the flats has its lights on.
Later, there’s a knock on the door. It’s the guy from the other flat, who is out of his head. Maybe it’s the half-full bottle of Japanese whiskey in his hand, maybe it’s something stronger. He introduces himself as Harry, and elicits the name of Adam, the bloke who we’ve been following so far. Through small talk we learn that they’re the first residents in some new flats. Harry jokes (or does he?) that the windows don’t open as a suicide would bring down the property prices.
Harry (Paul Mescal in a Northern accent and dodgy moustache) tries to get himself invited in for a drink, or maybe a quick fuck. Adam is having none of it. He is a melancholic man, and in no mood for company at the moment, certainly not from someone as boisterous as Harry is at the moment. When Harry finally goes, Adam goes to his record collection and pulls out the LP “Now That’s What I Call Music 10”. He puts on Build by the Housemartins.
Although we will later encounter a Blur song, which sounds (and indeed is) from a different era, for the moment the music is placing us firmly in the mid-1980s. Alongside the Housemartins, we hear the Fine Young Cannibals, Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Alison Moyet. At first you think these are signifiers to let us know when the action is taking place. Later we learn that they are a nostalgic device used by Adam to revisit his tragic past.
Adam looks through some family photos, and discovers a photo of a house, presumably where he used to live. He gets a train to the suburbs, finds the house and stares into the window. As he walks off to a nearby field, he sees a man in the distance who has a similar dodgy moustache to Harry. The man gives him a certain look, and Adam follows him into a convenience store. When they chat in the shop, the man invites him home.
Just as you think this is some cruising routine, the man introduces Adam to his wife, who looks at Adam lovingly and asks how he’s been. We gradually intuit that these are Adam’s parents, although that seem to be about the same age as Adam. When chatting in the kitchen with mum, Adam lets slip that he’s gay. She is filled with mid 1980s-style worry. Hasn’t he seen the AIDS adverts with the grave stones? Won’t he be rejected by everyone he knows? Isn’t his life lonely?
When Adam and Harry next meet in the lift, Harry is much more coherent. When he turns up again at the front door, Adam lets him in this time. As Harry looks through the photos on the counter, he asks questions. Adam explains that his parents died in a car crash when he was 12. His father died instantly, his mother lingered several days in hospital, having lost an eye. Adam’s grandmother thought it would be too traumatic to let the boy say goodbye to his mother before she died.
Adam and Harry make their first tentative steps towards a relationship. They go out clubbing, but also eat pizzas together in front of mediocre tv. And they have sex. When Adam’s mother asked him if being gay wasn’t awfully lonely, his answer was that his loneliness was nothing to do with being gay. But slowly, for maybe the first time since the accident which killed his parents, he starts to build an emotional connection with another human being.
Every so often, he revisits his family home, where one or other parent welcomes him joyously. Dad is even less troubled by Adam’s sexuality than his wife, though this may be partly down to him “deducing” his son’s gayness when as a child “you couldn’t throw a ball for shit”. As Adam continues his relationship with his long lost parents, he starts to have headaches and hallucinations, as if his brain cannot cope with it all.
In a key scene, set just before Christmas, the Pet Shop Boys come on the telly. Adam’s mum automatically sings along
Maybe I didn’t hold you
All those lonely, lonely times
And I guess I never told you
I am so happy that you’re mine
If I made you feel second best
I’m so sorry I was blind
You were always on my mind
When the more jaunty chorus breaks out, dad joins in
Tell me, tell me that your sweet love hasn’t died
Give me, One more chance to keep you satisfied
I remember way back when reading an interview with Neil Tennant. The interviewer praised him for the deadpan delivery which added a layer of irony which was missing from the Elvis version. This was not intentional, protested Tennant. It’s just the way he sings. Whatever he meant to do, this fits the mood in which the song is used here. Mum makes the apology that Adam desperately needs to hear, even though it is not clear whether she really means it.
When I first heard about All Of Us Strangers, I wasn’t sure I’d like it. The idea of a modern-day ghost story loosely based on a Japanese novella just sounded too corny. I had a feeling it would be all gimmick and little depth. But this film is a sensitive look at loneliness, grief, and dealing with traumas of the past. Without being too preachy, we also witness how many small gains gay rights have made in a few decades (although of course, there’s still quite a way to go).
Having seen the cast list, I already knew that the acting was bound to be impressive. There is also a great original score. On top of this, for those of us who were around at the time, there is a great soundtrack, up to the very end when Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s The Power of Love plays over the end credits. When people got up to leave early, it felt somehow disrespectful. In fact, it felt disrespectful to leave the film at all before affording it the contemplation that it surely deserves.
CinePhil 