Through Black Spruce (2018)
Through Black Spruce is a good drama-thriller that’s an arm’s length away from being great. Some of its power is undone by the story’s structure but it deals with pertinent aboriginal issues. It ratchets up the drama and tension as details about its central mystery emerge.
It’s been nearly a year since Annie (Tanaya Beatty) saw her twin sister and three months since she was anonymously listed as missing to the police. Last spotted in Toronto trying to become a model, someone’s got to know something but like so many aboriginal women, the trail has gone cold. In a last-ditch effort, Annie decides to follow the trail herself. Meanwhile, her uncle Will (Brandon Oakes) must deal with the local drug dealers who believe he has been snitching on them to the police.
There are two plot lines in Through Black Spruce and they're not juggled well. Will’s on-screen, uninterrupted for 20 minutes at a time. You wonder how his story connects to Annie’s search for Suzanne. You wind up forgetting about the other plot completely. The thugs harass him basically go around doing whatever they want and you know he’s only able to take so much before he blows up. But then what? Taking the law into his own hands doesn't seem like that bad of an idea - as long as he gets away with it. This leads to what I thought was an interesting, introspective sort of journey I enjoyed going on.
Then, the film will snap to Annie, whose rag-tag investigation also keeps you interested. Combined, the stories touch upon a loss of identity, the dangers of drug addiction, the bleakness of small-town life and the boredom which accompanies it, what it means to be Cree (or for all intents and purposes, any other Canadian First-Nation), and more. Annie’s story is particularly interesting because it feels real. When she gets a clue as to what happened to her sister, it isn’t some earth-shattering reveal like a bit of camera footage or a fingerprint, it’s a friend who tells her “yeah… she was doing this at the time, and she didn’t look very good”.
The storylines do eventually converge in an ending that’s fun but Hollywood-y, nothing like the genuine plots which preceded it. Other aspects, such as a couple of coma-induced “visions” Will experiences should’ve been trimmed. When the film is bleak and true, that’s when it’s at its best.
Overall, Through Black Spruce does get better as it goes along, and partially because some of the weaker actors are relegated to small parts at the beginning. Tanaya Beatty and Brandon Oakes are quite good in the leads. They make you wish the picture was better than it is but elevate it enough to make it worth seeing. (Theatrical version on the big screen, March 29, 2019)
