Jimpa - Movie Review - Fremantle Shipping News

A few disclosures. I am not Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Trans, Intersex or Queer. Or part of a LGBTIQ+ community. And I do not pretend to have any deep appreciation of issues that surface from time to time within these communities. But, like most Australians, I have and have had family members, friends and colleagues who are or have been part of one or other of these communities. And so I feel connected and curious about the issues that do arise within them from time to time.

If you don’t feel in some way connected or curious about the issues that arise within these communities from time to time, then you should probably not see this movie. But I did and I enjoyed it. As I say later, I rate it 4 stars out of 5.

For me, the movie operates on a number of levels. First, as a coming of age story for 16 year old Frances (Aud Mason-Hyde), who identifies as ‘they’ and being Trans; and is the President of the LGBTIQ+ club at their Adelaide High School.

Then as a classic love story, with a filmmaker daughter, Hannah (Olivia Colman), the mother of Frances, desperately wanting to get closer to her Gay father who lived in Adelaide until he left for Amsterdam when she was 13, and still lives in Amsterdam, but has recently suffered a stroke. She and her family, and her sister Emily (Kate Box), need to see him and resolve things. There seems to be some unfinished business between Hannah and her father in particular. She believes she can make a film about him, and live her life, without tensions ever having to intrude.

And finally, as some sort of reflection, on Hannah’s father’s part – Jim, the grandpa whom Frances has endearingly named ‘Jimpa’ (John Lithgow) – about how the Gay/Queer politics of the 80’s seems to have lost its way in some respects. He’s an academic and old Gay rights campaigner. He doesn’t seem to want to fully embrace the strata of the more recent LGBTIQ+ times. A bisexual, to Jimpa, is a ‘coward’; they simply need to decide just what their sexual identity is and declare themselves. On issues like that, and others, Jimpa is highly opinionated; and it’s beyond my experience or competence to do more than note his expression of opinion! Jim also seems to be grappling with getting older and in fact has his eyes set on a new academic position in Helsinki.

The movie is directed by Sophie Hyde, born and bred in Adelaide. Sophie and Matthew Cormack wrote the screenplay. I loved the crispness and intensity of the writing. Like being engrossed in a good novel. All the reviews of the film point out that it is partly autobiographical. Sophie Hyde’s father came out at some point. And Frances, played by Aud Mason-Hyde, is Sophie Hyde’s daughter and, in real life, identifies as Trans.

The dialogue, as good as it is, is taken to another level by the great cast – Olivia Colman playing Jimpa’s daughter and Frances’ mother, and John Lithgow as Jimpa. You can’t fault their performances. While some have noted this is an ‘Australian’ movie – with an Aussie director and Australian actors Aud Mason-Hyde, Daniel Henshall, Kate Box, Eamon Farren and Deborah Kennedy all speaking Australian – Colman speaks with a received English accent. It didn’t affect my appreciation of the movie, however you are warned. She has great star power, of course. And it was no doubt sensible to avoid the challenge Meryl Streep set herself by playing Lindy Chamberlain with a much discussed Aussie accent! John Lithgow is an American but his accent, while a little curious, didn’t get in the way of my appreciation of the movie either. Possibly it’s a little trans-Atlantic or trans-Pacific, even a tad Irish, I’m not sure. After many years living in The Netherlands Jimpa’s accent no doubt would have evolved!

If one were to be a little critical of the film it may be to say that by having these various plot strands running through it at times unnecessarily complicates the story, causing it to meander and become a little repetitive and drawn out.

The plot line is taken in an interesting direction when you learn, early on, as Hannah and her husband, Frances’ father (played by Daniel Henshall), are heading off to Amsterdam, that Frances has decided she’s going to take an early Gap Year before her final year at High School in Adelaide and spend it with Jimpa in Amsterdam. Neither Hannah nor her hubby think it’s a good idea. They know a darker side to Jimpa. By the time we land in Schiphol we are well primed and looking forward to meeting Jimpa.

The film gets you to Amsterdam pretty quickly. If, I suspect like many attending the preview I attended at Luna Leederville, you think this is going to be, in large part, an Amsterdam biopic, then you will be sorely disappointed! Apart from a few establishment shots of canals and bicycles and a University entrance, there was little of the Amsterdam one loves to visit to encourage you to see the movie just for Amsterdam! There was also a brief visit to Helsinki, but the establishment shot there was in passing. A part of a modern glass building. So don’t go to the film expecting a guided tour of Amsterdam!

There are a few Queer nightclub scenes and coming of age moments for Frances that inoffensively add colour and movement to the movie. And reflections and flashbacks to when Jimpa and his Gay Amsterdam friends were younger. Which help set the scene. And another involving Jimpa as an older man. But otherwise the movie, for me, is not so much much about Jimpa and his life challenges and whether or not it makes sense for him suddenly to be thinking Helsinki is a good idea, or even about Frances coming of age, as it is about how, if at all, Hannah and Jimpa will resolve their relationship. In what circumstances did Jimpa, all those years ago, leave Adelaide? How did it affect Hannah? Did Jimpa selfishly leave his family behind? Can you live your life and make a movie without conflict?

You’ll have to see the movie to find out.

Shouldn’t sign off without saying how much I loved the music throughout. And Frances gets to sing!

As you can tell, I enjoyed Jimpa. 4/5 Stars.

Season starts 19 February at Luna Leederville + Luna on SX

By Michael Barker, Editor, Fremantle Shipping News

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