MQFF NOTES: Departure (2015, Dir. Andrew Steggall)

I'm taking a holiday from my dislike for self-hating homo films to sing the praises of first time director Andrew Steggall and his wondrously enigmatic first feature, Departure. Is it a holiday, though? What am I doing here? What's Juliet Stevenson doing here? She's packing things up in a house in the south of France, or is she? Her son's with her (played with exacting precociousness by Alex Lather), or is he? Is he dead already? Is she? Something is definitely amiss. Why is nobody happy? And where's the father?

Floating atop the intangible malaise, Lather's Elliot, a precociously assured young poet with a penchant for archaic military wear, gets a bit of holiday lust going with a local teen, Clément (Phenix Brossard), who enjoys the attention as much as his self-hating self can manage. He's a bit of a lust magnet actually and while Steggall may not go full Euro-gay here (there is no sexy pontoon/jetty scene) there is a bit of on-water action.

But the tint of coming-of-age is secondary; it is really only there to feed into the overall mood and existential thematics.

Departure is propelled by its esoteric aloofness, just as it is buoyed by its lush locale and prestige cinematography. Steggall and everyone involved here know what they are doing, even if they have no intention of making it easy for their audience. Indeed, the disorienting questions continuously raised by the film's mechanics (the editing, the narrative structure and the shifts in character) are almost its raison d'être.

This is a consummate, refreshingly complex debut from a director to watch. It is a film to get lost in but nobody will be wandering around thinking Steggall's hands are anything but sure. He won't drop you.

But he might hold you under.

★★★☆

Departure screened as part of the Melbourne Queer Film Festival 2016.

You can check out other films from the festival here.