I asked to review Sew Torn for a few reasons, but the biggest reason was curiosity. How, exactly, could a film be so closely themed around, of all things, seamstressing? Well, it is. It really, really is. It’s also a varied, funny crime drama which manages to incorporate elements of existential fantasy along the way, and it’s highly likely to rank as one of my favourite films of the year for its defiantly zingy, creative approach.
We get two visual symbols at the film’s start: there’s a reel of thread, and a briefcase – a briefcase which, until recently, was handcuffed to someone: there are handcuffs still attached to the handle. Keep those symbols in mind. A brief voiceover from our protagonist, seamstress Barbara (Eve Connolly) invites us to mull over what could have brought her to the chaotic point where we first meet her. It wasn’t always like this, of course. In calmer times, though not exactly happier times, i.e. before the briefcase was a thing, Barbara had been living an isolated life since her mother’s passing, trying (and failing) to keep their family seamstress business running. It seems there just isn’t enough trade for their ‘talking portraits’ speciality which bedeck both the shop and the living quarters beyond it. A tapestry image gets connected to a recording of the loved one; pull a length of thread, and you get to hear their voices again. Needless to say, Barbara has become unhealthily reliant on talking portraits of her and her mother, even though some of the voice recordings reveal the darker times which overtook them both.
Already struggling, then, Barbara is soon running late to the world’s worst seamstress job: altering a wedding dress which is already being worn by a deeply unpleasant bride-to-be who wastes no opportunity to berate Barbara as she works. A mishap with a button sends Barbara racing back to the shop for a replacement, though – all considered – the ways things turn out, and given the business is on its knees already, a sharper jab with the needle, or even just abandoning the dreadful woman to a buttonless fate would have been completely reasonable. However, Barbara is diligent enough and still considerate enough of her mother’s pride in her work, to do the decent thing. And, as it stands, she may still have run into an unexpected situation, out on a mountainous back road…
There’s been an accident. There are two injured men lying in the road, there are guns and – oh, hey, it’s the briefcase, and it turns out it was recently handcuffed to one of these men. What best to do?
Like Barbara says on her initial voiceover: choices, choices. The grand rule here, if there is one, is that people make decisions and those decisions initiate a chain of events. Then, these events draw in others, as they do here, because the chances of a mysterious briefcase not mattering to someone important are slim to none. In many respects, Sew Torn tackles an age-old narrative idea – the ‘wrong place, wrong time’ motif – but it does so much with it that it never feels anything but quirky, clever and bold. There’s so much to praise. Its tragicomic elements are assured. It has a strangely unsettling setting which seems to be small-town America transported to…Switzerland, full of pretty contrasts and crisp, colourful locations, making the events of the film feel like a weird blip against an almost fantasy landscape. Oh, and the script is wonderfully economical, with Connolly often enacting Barbara’s great woes without words at all. She’s great, by the way, managing to be both sympathetic and magnetic, and bouncing off a great supporting cast, with particular praise for the brilliant John Lynch and the equally effective Calum Worthy. I don’t recall a film ever quite so taken with sewing as a theme – May Canady sews, sure, but it feels more incidental than fundamental to her own journey. In Sew Torn – based on a short film, but never struggling to work as a feature – every element of the plot is linked to sewing in a way which is, let’s be honest, barking mad, but oh-so clever and compelling. It’s a film which almost makes you feel bad for owning three sewing kits and having not the faintest clue what to do with any of them.
As it moves towards its conclusion, playing with a range of outcomes and possibilities as it goes, Sew Torn does slow somewhat to allow characters to develop; this is the only slight lull in the film’s pace, but getting to know the characters works, too. It’s almost as if it’s all been meticulously sounded out and planned. Look: a film with this level of commitment to its central theme must be confident in what it’s doing, and so it turns out. Director Freddy Macdonald, born in the year 2000 (!) is clearly a young talent to watch and it will be very interesting to see where he goes next. This is quite the first feature: it promises great things, it delivers great things, but most importantly, it works incredibly well on its own terms, presenting audiences with something hugely entertaining and innovative. Curiosity satisfied, and then some.
Sew Torn is on UK and Ireland digital platforms 31 March from Vertigo Releasing.