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Event
LOVE THE ONE YOU LOVE
Remember that t-shirt that said COUPLES ARE BORING AND EVERYBODY KNOWS IT? Now that Anti-Valentines is over, Spectacle is pleased to present a swirling and intimate vision of modern dating from South Africa: Jenna Bass feature debut LOVE THE ONE YOU LOVE.
Anchored by the thousand-gigawatt chemistry of stars Chi Mhende and Andile Nebulane, the film posits love and autonomy at seductive odds, piercing out angles on the most telling minutiae of a relationships long and winding forge. Mhende stars as Terri, a phone sex worker who, while deeply in love with her boyfriend Sandile (Nebulane), cant help but wonder if things are too perfect. Along the way, a despondent IT worker named Eugene (Loew Venter) uncovers a master-list of couples on the Dark Web that serves as justification to try winning back his ex, with whose much younger brother he has kept a fraught friendship.
The two plot strands go unlinked until the films third act, a disarmingly sober counterbalancing of romance and reality; the films blurring of conspiracy and superstition makes for a perfect analogue with a lovers mindset. Largely improvised around a twenty-page treatment and aided immeasurably by a steady and endlessly observant handheld camera, LOVE is equal parts tactile psychodrama and freewheeling, hyperlinked RomCom. Bass film digs deeper into timeless conundrums of trust and compatibility than the sociopolitics of its Cape Town milieu, but questions about identity and class in the New South Africa are never far from the viewers mind. Simpler times resurface as impressionistic digital fragments; passionate arguments and awkward yearnings play out in remarkably real time.
What is likely a tight budget is masked by Bass intimate, rather than irritatingly shaky, hand held camerawork and a dedication to her characters words and how they relate to each other. The film has more than one sequence that feels like we, as viewers, are eavesdropping as much as watching the romantic drama unfold. Elizabeth Kerr, The Hollywood Reporter
We need more diverse narratives about Africa the ones in films like SEX, OKRA AND SALTED BUTTER, PUMZI, and LOVE THE ONE YOU LOVE. Lindiwe Dovey, The Guardian
http://www.spectacletheater.com/love-the-one-you-love/
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LocationSPECTACLE THEATER (View)
124 South 3rd Street
Brooklyn, NY 11249
United States
Categories
| Kid Friendly: No |
| Dog Friendly: No |
| Non-Smoking: Yes! |
| Wheelchair Accessible: No |
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