Stay Review

Stay (2013)

Cast: Taylor Schilling, Aidan Quinn, Michael Ironside
Director: Wiebke von Carolsfeld
Country: Canada | Ireland
Genre: Drama
Official Trailer: Here

Editor’s Note: Stay is now open in limited release

“Idyll by the sea” exclaims a housing development billboard that decorates the desolate landscape of Stay, ironically fronted by the film as a monument to the dashed dreams that have served to dampen the verdant allure the Irish countryside’s more commonly been accorded onscreen. It’s not only the development’s distinct absence that might tempt us to mispronounce the sign. Canadian director Wiebke von Carolsfeld here captures an image of Ireland as accurate as any of the country’s own directors’: hers is a sky every bit as brooding as her characters, its dark clouds and their dry eyes equally indicative of a restrained force that feels any moment about to erupt in floods.

Canadian director Wiebke von Carolsfeld here captures an image of Ireland as accurate as any of the country’s own directors’: hers is a sky every bit as brooding as her characters…

They are a young Canadian woman and an Irishman almost two decades her senior, newly moved to a Connemara town on the coast of Ireland to be together in peace. But like the foreboding landscape, dotted with promises of development, it’s not long before the relationship takes on a dark quality of stasis. Adapted from the novel by Aislinn Hunter, von Carolsfeld’s script takes its chances in asking us to tag along without much insight into the love at risk here; the opening image of a smiling awakening aside, it’s only our own inference that offers any indication of what brought these two together, and what—until now, at least—has kept them happily in each other’s arms.

The argument that erupts in the wake of a pregnancy announcement and sends her back to Montreal for a break comes so soon in the film that it’s difficult—especially given the characters—to mourn much for the relationship. He’s a disgraced Dublin professor given to petty arguments, not least of all further delaying local development; she’s an intelligent kid who, even if caught up in contrived mommy issues, deserves a great deal better. Perhaps it’s the demands of international co-production that’s cost the movie its balance—the novel’s action is exclusive to Ireland—but it’s a balance without which the drama struggles to stand even slightly. Stay is a terribly trite film, in spite of all its abundant earnestness.

The Point is pushed at every turn above and beyond the story itself, leaving the characters to feel less realised figures than rote structural supports tasked with representational roles

Or perhaps because of it: von Carolsfeld’s script deviates more than mildly from the source, and hers is a story so suffocatingly structured it’s sure to garner no comparable acclaim. Each character, in isolation, uncovers their past in some respect and in so doing learns more of themselves; each deals with pregnancy from a perspective to make them reconsider their lives; each entertains a love interest before appreciating their true feelings: The Point is pushed at every turn above and beyond the story itself, leaving the characters to feel less realised figures than rote structural supports tasked with representational roles. It’s laboured—pun entirely intended—to the point of ludicrousness when a local girl’s water breaks as she sits in tears on her mother’s deathbed, one of the film’s more subtle thematic tactics.

Only the able work of a capable cast can do much to salvage this structural wreck from its roteness: Aidan Quinn and Taylor Schilling give a good deal to their roles, even if the former’s handicapped by his frankly irredeemable character. Support is strong from terrific young talent Barry Keoghan—as eye-catching here as in Stalker—and Michael Ironside, who populate the film with peripheral characters often more engaging than the principals. Monsieur Lazhar-lenser Ronald Plante frames “this dump at the end of the world” fittingly, spying the beauty soured by bad decisions. Would that Stay were as attuned to its characters as to the landscapes they trudge through; where the land makes us long for what might be, this relationship makes us glad for what is not.

[notification type=”star”]46/100 ~ BAD. Would that Stay were as attuned to its characters as to the landscapes they trudge through; where the land makes us long for what might be, this relationship makes us glad for what is not. [/notification]