Well, I’m meeting someone here. Supposed to be.
In this quiet, introspective, beautiful film, veteran character actors Dale Dickey and Wes Studi get the chance to hold the screen as two aging friends attempting to reconnect in their twilight years and they basically prove that they’re American treasures, if there was still any doubt remaining about that. Dickey plays Faye, a widow who has come to a campsite in the Colorado mountains in order to reconnect with Studi’s character, Lito. They were friends as kids and now they’ve both lost their spouses and they’re meeting to try to reconnect as friends and, though this remains mostly unspoken, to see if they might connect as something more than friends.
This is a deeply understated movie, a movie where many things remain unspoken. The script is spare and stripped down, but that’s fine because Dickey and Studi have the kinds of weathered faces that can speak volumes without saying a word. They have faces that speak of lives lived and sorrows suffered and wounds survived and they both embue their characters with incredible depth. They feel absolutely real and unstudied; this is naturalistic acting at its finest, never overplaying a single moment, never feeling like you’re watching “actors.” And the film understands that this story of these hurting people seeking solace with each other is what we’re here for and the vast majority of the film is just spent in quiet moments of them being with each other, sometimes talking, sometimes not, sometimes playing music, sometimes just sitting in silence next to each other and watching the sunset. There are a few other characters in small parts and I should mention Michelle Wilson and Benja Thomas as a lesbian couple at a nearby campsite. They both give wonderful performances in their brief scenes.
But, ultimately, this is Faye’s story and I was deeply moved by this quiet, beautiful and emotional movie. It’s the debut feature from writer-director Max Walker-Silverman and it’s remarkably assured for a debut, confident in its ability to pull you into its slow rhythms. I’ll be watching to see what Walker-Silverman does next. But A Love Song is exactly the kind of small movie that I love to find and champion; it’s a beautiful film that makes no concessions to the spirit of the modern multiplex and, amidst all the sturm and drang, it’s a quiet, heartfelt breath of a movie that left me in a place of real peace and quietness. Don’t let its size fool you; it has a small focus and a tight running time and one setting, but it’s a masterpiece. 4 stars.
tl;dr – quiet, slowly-paced, heartfelt, understated & deeply emotional movie boasts beautiful lead performances from Dale Dickey and Wes Studi; a gorgeous, lovely film. 4 stars.