Maven's Nest
Reel Life: Flick Pix
- Marco Calvani at HIGH TIDE New York LGBTQ Film Festival’s NewFest36, New York City Premiere (October 14, 2024) Photo Credit: Marleen Moise
The beautiful but predatory ocean around Provincetown can be navigated by love.
By Nora Lee Mandel
HIGH TIDE
Written and Directed by Marco Calvani
Produced by Mickey Liddell, Pete Shilaimon, and Marco Calvani
101 mins. Not Rated. In English, and Portuguese with English subtitles
Released by Strand Releasing and LD Entertainment
With: Marco Pigossi, James Bland, Mya Taylor, Marisa Tomei, Bill Irwin, and Bryan Batt.
Opens theatrically October 18, 2024 and expands to Los Angeles on October 25, and select cities throughout November.
"I invite the audience to join along on this young man’s journey with no compromises; and for everything that Lourenço doesn’t say, to fill in the space with contemplation; to feel, weigh, identify. It doesn’t matter if they’re queer or straight, Americans or immigrants… Ultimately, HIGH TIDE is a universal tale about self-acceptance and belonging. To a country, to a community, to someone else, to one-self." - Marco Calvani, in Director’s Statement
Italian debut feature film writer/director Marco Calvani, now an Angeleno, brings an outsider’s acute eye to the complex gay social structure of Provincetown, “P-Town”, on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. His younger, naïve surrogate is hunky small-town Brazilian accountant “Lourenço” (Executive Producer Marco Pigossi). Stranded by the American tourist lover he followed to a backyard cottage, he is the metaphorical seal who is warned that this beautiful ocean is full of predator sharks.
As the season ends, his visa is expiring and “Lourenço” is lying to everybody. He only feels like himself at the nude beach where he plunges into the surf at day’s end. Cinematographer Oscar Ignacio Jimeñez captures gorgeous sunsets and moon rises.
For a guy whose Catholic guilt kept him in the closet at home, the temptations are overwhelming and his choices are narrowing. There are artists and the old queens who decades ago made Provincetown a bohemian enclave; they shift between paternal comforting (Bill Irwin as his landlord) and leering (Bryan Batt as a lawyer). There’s the seasonal workers supervised by flinty home and business owners; vacationing carousers and their drug dealers; the endlessly aggressive hook-up styles, and more that some may find either stereotypes or satires. Casually confident about disease prevention, nobody seems to have bothered to bring or get condoms.
Two appealing, fully-rounded characters do appear in “Lourenço”s orbit to make a real connection. Though surrounded by partier friends, including trans “Crystal” (played by Mya Taylor), "Maurice" (played by James Bland) is a nice guy from Queens. On their dinner date, "Maurice" astutely points out why he is uncomfortable there, and later in the bedroom, as one of the few African-Americans. Though Jimeñez’ camera makes much of their black-and-white-ish couplings (balanced by the two intimacy coordinators listed in the credits), they emotionally share as outsiders from religious families.
Marco Pigossi and Marisa Tomei in HIGH TIDE, Photo Courtesy of LD Entertainment
Executive Producer Marisa Tomei, as “Miriam” the ex-wife of “Lourenço”s nasty boss, is the only female in the film who talks about love. She instinctively sees “Lourenço” needs some (Jewish?) mothering and support. He, in turn, takes an interest in her paintings. Her abstract expressionist pieces (actually by Shira-Lee Shalit), reminded me of those by my family friend the late Lora Civkin, who summered on Fire Island. “Miriam”s description of how love inspired her brighter colors pings his heartache, but also revives his sense of possible fulfillment.
Calvani winks at rom com endings. Has “Lourenço” really learned from this experience by grabbing at an impulsive solution?
The themes in High Tide are echoed in another film at this year’s “NewFest”, Dutch director Dennis Alink’s Out (streaming through October 22). There, high school boyfriends leave a small town for what they expect will be Amsterdam’s art scene, but get depressingly waylaid by its gay party culture. These younger and naïve characters seem more obnoxious because they do not get the self-realization about relationships provided in High Tide.
10/18/2024
Nora Lee Mandel is a member of New York Film Critics Online. Her reviews are counted in the Rotten Tomatoes TomatoMeter:
Complete Index to Nora Lee Mandel's Movie Reviews
My reviews have appeared on: FF2 Media; Film-Forward; Lilith, FilmFestivalTraveler; and, Alliance of Women Film Journalists and for Jewish film festivals. Shorter versions of my older reviews are at IMDb's comments, where non-English-language films are listed by their native titles.
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