52 Films by Women Vol 6. 28. HERE BEFORE (Director: Stacey Gregg)

 

Making her feature film debut, the Northern Irish playwright Stacey Gregg directs the heck out of Here Before, a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it, highly accomplished slow-burn Belfast-set psychological thriller with a knockout twist. Andrea Riseborough, who works with women film directors as much as their male counterparts, gives an unsettling performance as Laura, a mother whose daughter died in a road traffic accident and who becomes obsessed with Megan (Niamh Dornan), the young daughter of her new next-door neighbour, Marie (Eileen O’Higgins) who has moved in her tattooed partner, Chris (Martin McCann).

Chris makes an immediate impact on Laura’s son, Tadhg (Lewis McAskie), a surly boy who attends Dunmurry Primary School along with Megan. They shoot hoops in the makeshift basket outside Laura’s home. Tadhg (pronounced Tie) wants to get a tattoo. ‘Not until you’re eighteen,’ snaps his mother. Laura’s husband, Brendan (Jonjo O’Neill) is less than impressed. He’s a blue-collar guy, evidenced by the clip-on name tag. We’re not sure exactly what he does for a living - Gregg makes a virtue out of withholding information – but Chris accuses Brendan in one scene of looking down his nose at him.

The film begins with the blurred out of focus lights of passing traffic as viewed through a car window. Not the most original of openings, but perfect for a film that invites us to question what we are seeing. Gregg will show us a location – an overhead shot of a stretch of road during the day – and not immediately explain why we are seeing it. Laura is properly introduced scratching at earth in her front garden, an unnaturalistic and heavily metaphorical gesture – we can interpret it as clawing her way to be reunited with her daughter, except that she is buried elsewhere. Indeed Laura finds a red, twisted plastic toy windmill, the sort you blow on to make it spin round. Laura does just that, shortly before Megan wanders over to say hello.

The young child, who cannot be more than eight years old, appears to be intruding. What has she been told about talking to strangers? Laura’s face transforms into a smile. Adults – especially parents - always want to be smiling and approachable towards children, to put them at their ease. It’s the fear of the bawling baby that prompts them, a sound that can reduce adults to helplessness. Megan’s direct line of questioning feels awkward. ‘Who lived there before?’ ‘An old lady.’ ‘’Where has she gone?’ ‘She’s gone away,’ replies Laura, which of course could mean anything; it could mean that she’s dead.

Because the child Megan made the introduction first, Laura gets on the wrong foot with the new neighbours. Still, Marie smiles at Laura. She is young and pretty. Laura, by contrast, has a vacant, barely disguised haunted look. There’s tension between the two mothers, unspoken but present, notably when Megan is left standing outside the school gates. Megan is too willing to get into Laura’s car as Laura picks up Tadhg – Tadhg is the sort of surly kid who throws himself in the back seat of the car with a sense of entitlement and irritation, embarrassed and keen to leave. Tadhg is even more irritated that Megan joins them. Who is this interloper who suddenly acts as if she knows them?

It is this latter detail that really grates with Tadhg. He remembers his sister and is aware of the loss. But Megan is no substitute. Laura is happy to give the young wee child a ride home, who looks so abandoned in her yellow raincoat. Tadhg gruffly tells her to go ask a teacher. Megan ignores him. She is interested in talking to Laura, as if compelled to do so. After she is dropped off at home – and Megan’s home seems much more run down than Laura’s – we don’t see Marie acknowledge her. We sense that something else is going on. But you don’t ask too many prying questions about your neighbours, do you? You don’t want to get on the wrong side of them.

After giving Megan a ride home more than once, Laura invites her to dinner. Chris does the cooking. In a conventional film, we might see the group around the table, with Tadhg looking as irritated as ever. However, Gregg starts the scene with Megan returning from the bathroom. Her camera is placed in the hallway, so we see Megan walking with her back to us towards the kitchen table through an open door, Laura’s husband and son obscured from view. This is a really efficient way of unsettling us. We feel like an intruder at the table, being aware of what we’re not seeing. Megan asks Laura to make a ketchup face on her bread in a way that is almost shocking. Laura squeezes two thick beads for the eyes, positioned close together, and a long ‘u’-shaped mouth. It is the sort of picture of a face that a child might make. It is also as if Megan was making a demand that Laura’s dead daughter, Josie, once did.

Naturally enough, Laura and Tadhg visit Josie’s grave. We see from the headstone that she was born in 1999. Gregg shows in close-up the stems of roses being cleaned before they are placed in a flower holder by the grave – a much better way of displaying them than simply placing a bouquet at right angles to the headstone. The grave needs some attention. Josie’s name is obscured from view.

Laura wants to know more about Megan and finds Megan’s schoolbook outside her neighbour’s house. It has a picture of four people: mum and dad, Megan and Tadhg. Laura shudders. Just then, Chris opens the door. Laura returns the book. Chris is quick to take it and end the conversation.

Megan’s insistence that she has spent time with Laura’s family needles Tadhg. He breaks Chris and Marie’s front door’s window. The police are called. By this point Laura has started to believe that Megan is the reincarnation of Josie. Laura even has a hardback book, ‘Reincarnation and Children’. I’m not sure if this particular book is real, but there is a slew of literature on the subject, including Carol Bowman’s ‘Children’s Past Lives’ and ‘Life Before Life: A Scientific Investigation of Children’s Memories of Previous Lives’ by Dr Jim B. Tucker.

In an early scene, Megan talks about wanting to go hang gliding, an oddly specific request for a child. (Why not a hot air balloon?)  Later, Laura collects her from school and takes her for a ride. We see inside Megan’s class a set of children’s coat pegs. Megan’s name has been crossed out and replaced in red marker with Josie. In a deliberately awkward sequence, we see Laura and Marie at school, missing one another, one walks down a corridor and disappears out of shot as the other appears, approaching from a different angle. Marie surprisingly appears outside a classroom where Brendan is addressing a group of children to talk about caution. ‘What does the word ‘caution’ mean to you?’ One child answers incorrectly. Another young girl smooths her own hair. The close ups and fast cutting, combined with a tremble in Brendan’s voice give the impression that something is very, very wrong. And, of course, Laura has taken Megan out of school without permission.

By this point, Laura has collected Megan from school one too many times and taken her to the park upon her insistence. ‘Can we go to the park?’ asks Megan. ‘We’ll see,’ replies Laura. ‘When people say, ‘we’ll see’, that usually means yes,’ Megan responds precociously. At the park, Megan hangs from a climbing frame. We see just her legs (below the knee) and her feet. She drops to the ground. Laura tells her to get in the car. Megan says ‘no’. Laura repeats the request. Megan repeats her answer. At the third time of asking, Laura shouts at the child. Megan walks quickly towards the car.

After this incident, Marie asks Laura not to pick up her daughter from school, to stay away from her. The two families almost come to blows. There is an implication that Marie has neglected her own daughter, for reasons not quite revealed. In an earlier scene, when the family is out shopping, Laura sees Megan. She offers to buy an item for her - we can’t quite see what it is. Marie takes the item from Laura. ‘I was going to get it for her.’ Class appears to be a source of tension, that Chris and Marie can’t provide for their daughter. Once more, something unspoken lingers.

The family go away for a brief trip and stay at a hotel with a palm tree nearby. The tree seems incongruous but suggests that they are far away. Brendan goofs with his son in the street. The group are almost happy. However, the trip doesn’t end Laura’s obsession with her neighbour’s child.

In one particularly vivid image, Laura is sitting in her car outside Dunmurry Primary School. A leaf rests in the middle of the windscreen, precisely obscuring Laura’s face. A single swish of the windscreen wiper removes it and then Laura sees Megan. In a horror film, this would be the reveal of a monster about to descend on its prey. Although, we’re not sure where Laura’s obsession will take her, she is not quite a threat to the child. Nevertheless, her behaviour is odd and disruptive.

The twist does what movie twists should do – utterly make sense and explain what we’ve seen before. We intuit it a few scenes before it is explained through dialogue. The finale is edge of the seat stuff, as the film really does move into thriller territory. When another window is broken, a shard of glass becomes a weapon.

As for the very end, we’re not sure if it is a flashback. What it does is cap a very accomplished debut film from a writer-director who has command of the medium. One might think the occasional fast cuts are crude – as is the scene when Laura is chopping carrots whilst Megan appears outside the window, causing Laura to cut herself - but what the hey? The use of long shots to show action yet withhold detail is cumulatively effective. There is little camera movement, but the framing is precise. Kudos to cinematographer Chloë Thomson. Editors Brian Philip Davis and Nick Emerson also put in a good shift.

Reviewed at Curzon Bloomsbury, Russell Square, Central London, Saturday 19 February 2022, 13:50 screening

Review originally published on Bitlanders.com