While watching ‘Never Rarely Sometimes Always‘, Eliza Hittman‘s film, another production that after the premiere (and award) at the Sundance Film Festival in early 2020 had the misfortune that its launch on screens was postponed for who knows how long as the pandemic lasts, I couldn’t help but wonder if the American director and screenwriter knew ‘4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days‘, the film that brought to Cristian Mungiu the ‘Palme d’Or’ award at the Cannes Film Festival in 2007. The two movies are similar not only because the topic of abortions is at their center. They take place decades away in very different political contexts but they nevertheless belong to the same debate about abortion, with moral and social impact, a debate that has been going on for more than half a century and is far from being decided. ‘Never Rarely Sometimes Always‘ and ‘4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days‘ have ome more thing in common: in their narrative structure both films juxtapose the issue of abortions with the theme of the solidarity between two young women, who face an adverse world alone, and who are ready to make enormous sacrifices to help each other in extreme situations. Both films are also films about social pressure, dilemmas and traumas related to abortions, but especially films about friendship and the sacrifices made in its name.
The story. Autumn (Sidney Flanigan) is a 17-year-old girl from a small town in Pennsylvania, who works with her friend Skyler (Talia Ryder) as a cashier at a supermarket. Autumn’s family is apparently normative, with an apparently normatively indifferent father. As her name suggests, Autumn is a melancholic, who keeps inside her feelings and insecurity, experienced enough to have started her sexual life at the age of 14, and hesitant enough not to know how to deal with the fact that she is pregnant. The girl does not want to keep the baby, the reasons are not clear and do not need to be explained, maybe she is too young to face motherhood or maybe the reason is related to the person of the father who we never learn who he is (I have a suspicion, but no I will share it). The clinics in her city are quite poorly equipped and they can’t help her anyway, because in Pennsylvania, being a minor, she can’t have an abortion without her parents’ consent. The two friends leave for New York, where abortion is possible, but their journey is unexpectedly prolonged, they run out of money and live three days and two nights of insecurity, unwanted adventures and not the most pleasant experiences in the big city. It’s a film about a completely different journey than the ones we are accustomed with in the films with provincials who come to New York, it’s a film about the coming of age of two young women, it’s a film about friendship.
The issue of abortions is always present without screenwriter and director Eliza Hittman taking an explicit position to impose on viewers. I believe that what differentiates ‘Never Rarely Sometimes Always‘ from other films with similar themes is the feminist perspective. The film is written and directed by a woman, the main characters and most of the supporting ones are women, and the feelings of the young girls at the beginning of life being the main theme, they are approached with a sensitivity coming from real life experiences. That is why I believe that this film should be seen by as many men and boys as the age of the teenage heroines, in order to understand their feelings, hesitations and pains. The interpretations of the two actresses in the main roles are superb and truthful. The scene that gives the film its name is anthological. New York is filmed very differently than in other movies, with its crushing subway stations, the indifferent, hurried and not very polite human universe that populates the metropolis. The minimalist style, the attention to detail, the story told from the point of view of the heroes also reminded me of Mungiu‘s films. But maybe Eliza Hittman didn’t even see them. However, her film stands alone as a mature and sensitive creation, a proof that good films have been released in this year 2020 as well.