The suffering in Ira Sachs’s remarkable new film, “Passages,” results not from cruelty but from truth, tnyfrontrow writes.
,” is a German movie director. His films are never shown, but Sachs leaves us in little doubt that they are good. “Passages” opens with Tomas on a set, directing an alluringly flamboyant bar scene on the last day of a shoot. He’s discerning and demanding, giving an actor piquant direction on the gestures to use and psychology to convey when walking down some stairs to join the festivities. But, to me, what guarantees the fictional Tomas’s artistry isn’t what we see of him working.
Those fault lines are on view from the start, with hints of trouble cropping up during an after-party celebrating the end of the shoot. Martin is there but unenthusiastic—too tired, he says, from a day’s work to want to dance with Tomas. A young woman at the party, Agathe , a schoolteacher, is there with her partner, who worked on the film, but she doesn’t want to go home with him and, amid the churn of the party, doesn’t want to explain why.
Yet Tomas isn’t quite ready to end his physically passionate relationship with Martin, and, for a little while, they and Agathe form not exactly a throuple but something more like an obtuse angle: the two sides, Agathe and Martin, connect only through their common point of intersection, Tomas, the vertex. Amid these complications, Tomas proves to be a spontaneous provocateur, producing further epicycles of enmity and turmoil.
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