One of my favourite Canadian movies at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, VILLAGE KEEPER is a movie to keep on your radar when it eventually gets a release in our country!
The TIFF Lowdown: After a massive loss, an overwhelmed Toronto mother discovers a very unusual way to process her grief. With her first dramatic feature, writer-director Karen Chapman creates an emotional and authentic study of a single mother trying to hold herself together.
Jean is the provider and (over)protector of her two teen children, Tamika and Tristin, and begrudgingly lives with her mother in a crowded Lawrence Heights apartment complex. Despite the kids learning to become more self-sufficient, Jean’s vision is too clouded by the past to see that they’re growing. She is haunted by violence in both their past and their present, and must help her children cope. Expertly using sound and flashbacks to construct a layered and full portrait of this woman’s life, Chapman reveals the trials and tribulations that women in Jean’s family carry with them.
Olunike Adeliyi — familiar to Festival audiences from Tammy’s Always Dying (TIFF ’19), Akilla’s Escape (TIFF ’20), and Backspot (TIFF ’23) — gives a stand-out performance as Jean, bringing her formidable range to play a woman choosing to embrace joy for herself, first.
Reaction: VILLAGE KEEPER really snuck up on me as the story unfolds; what I thought would be yet another little Toronto indie about a family under stress and fighting to make their place in the world becomes a deep and fascinating character study of dealing with a deep trauma. The movie is led by a performance by Olunike Adeliyi of quiet but amazing power. You feel her entire struggle in her face as she is trying to balance work, her growing kids and especially her mom all living together. The movie never takes an easy approach and it can be difficult to watch, but is ultimately rewarding in the end. What is really special is that I really FELT a place for Toronto here as well, from the subways to the streets along with even shots of the leads riding the subway (I will admit I’m a not-so-secret TTC Subway fan). This is the small scale Canadian Indie that I always love seeing and I can see it being a success at more festivals and even a small theatrical release.
Thanks to TIFF Media for assistance with this reaction article. This is one of the many movies playing at TIFF this year. For more information, point your browser to www.tiff.net!