Bridgend (2015)

Never leave town!

Tricky. For anyone familiar with the very real instance about the spate of suicides that has blighted the Welsh county of Bridgend, then this film is likely to be a mixed viewing experience. For sure during the film one can't help but keep thinking about the real events, the theories and facts of such, so it's a little distracting because Jeppe Rønde's film demands the utmost attention throughout.

It should be noted with all seriousness that this is only a meditation on the real events, it's not offering up answers, so people should seek out all official text and documentary of the events for the real picture. The film operates in the haunting space of the ethereal, both narratively and visually, with the youngsters at the story's core firmly caught between two worlds. The behaviour of the youths here will cause consternation in some quarters, their recklessness and daring on the surface not making sense, but really that's the point. Sense doesn't operate, not here or in the real world.

There's a number of striking sequences that show Jeppe Rønde as someone who has something to offer the indie art cinema circle. Such as the naked youngsters floating silently in the lake that has become their getaway place, and the finale at same lake that is akin to lambs paddling to their slaughter. Of course the director has had to fend off charges of sensationalism, romanticising suicide etc, that was to be expected, but he hasn't. He has produced a film of intrigue and emotional depth, one that stays with you long after that haunting final shot has vanished. 7/10

There’s a documentary made a few years earlier that is way more informative about these events in Bridgend than this really quite messy dramatisation. This really centres around the relationship between the newly arrived “Sara” (Hannah Murray) whose dad “Dave” (Steven Waddington) is a police officer and “Jamie” (Josh O’Connor). The latter lad is a lifer in this town and quite possibly knows something of what has caused the almost lemming-like suicidal activity that is puzzling this small community. Unfortunately, this film chooses not to focus on any aspects of these tragedies, but more to shine it’s light on the boozy and thuggish activities of the town’s fairly lawless youth - which I have to say, isn’t really very interesting. It’s got O’Connor in it, so of course there are sex and sexual tensions, but he’s nowhere near his best and the remainder of the cast - some of whom are real locals, deliver little more than a angrily scripted critique on a recently arrived family under pressure, some hormonal and cultish messing about in the river and it leaves us none the wiser about the root causes of these deaths nor about the complexities of the grief and, to an extent, the fear felt by those surviving. Perhaps the six years director Jeppe Rønde spent researching the film and acquainting himself with the community immersed him too deeply for him to remain even slightly objective about what he was trying to tell us, and so what we have is left isn’t really worth the film, sorry.