Aleem Khan's restrained, psychologically probing debut follows a white Muslim woman on the trail of her husband's secret life.
A queer element to this complex family crisis complicates matters further, in ways teased though not fully explored by a film that already has plenty of conflict, both latent and confrontational, to negotiate. Many of the film’s most vivid, affecting scenes detail the ordinary business of Mary’s home life and her relationship to religion, performed by Scanlan with intricate attention to physical gesture and routine. As Mary, a bereaved Dover homemaker caught between lives lived, imagined and concealed, she brings a grounding emotional conviction to a character whose decisions sometimes come from a soap-opera playbook, and deftly essays the various splintered identities of a white woman committed to the Muslim faith she took up for love, further adrift and incognito as a Briton in France. A North American distributor, however, has yet to step forward for a film that is by no means limited in its cultural resonance to the narrow band of south England and northern France it evocatively explores. After a brief prologue alluding to warm, placid marital contentment, we cut to Mary in the immediate throes of mourning for her husband Ahmed, a ferry captain who spent his days shuttling across the water to Calais and back — routinely sampling a Continental life she’s hitherto been happy to gaze at from the shore. It’s a short but jolting journey, an exercise in social and geographic disorientation that British-Pakistani filmmaker Aleem Khan probes to layered, thoughtful effect in his auspicious first feature “After Love.”
The biggest shock from the 2022 BAFTAs arguably came in the Best Actress category, which saw 'After Love' star Joanna Scanlan beat Lady Gaga.
In her acceptance speech, Scanlan pointedly and touchingly noted that Khan’s mother was both his inspiration in making this film and her own. It’s a tremendously empathetic piece of acting that anchors a film filled with emotional tremors: little earthquakes you’ll be unpicking for hours after the credits roll. After Love is exactly the sort of sharp, specific, surprising British film that the BAFTAs should be rewarding. Written and directed by Aleem Khan in his feature film debut, it’s a supremely moving story of self-discovery. And anyone who’s seen After Love will know it’s an incredibly special film that deserves every bit of recognition it’s getting. But Khan’s film is far too smart and nuanced to perpetuate this reductive idea for very long.
But what a night for Joanna Scanlan. No one who's seen gently provocative indie drama After Love, could begrudge the 60 year old Welsh actress her big moment.
In the name of the mother and the son and the holy smoke, may Jane now conquer Hollywood. Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Director. Wouldn’t that be a perfect way for this modern fairytale to end? In that it was roundly ignored at the Baftas and Oscars - and failed to set the box office alight - a part of her may have wondered if he was right. Like Peter, The Power of the Dog’s hero, Campion doesn’t go in for big shows of strength. Just as Chloe Zhao won Best Picture and Best Director for Nomadland, Jane Campion has pulled off the double-whammy with her alt-Western, The Power of the Dog. Like Zhao, Campion had never won Baftas in these categories before. In terms of the other major awards, “surprising” is not the word that springs to mind. Scanlan, in one scene, looks into the mirror and treats her wide-eyed reflection as if it were the most mesmerising of co-stars.