Breathing In

Back in the deep past, long before pale Europeans donned capes and went sneaking about in the night to drink blood, the earliest form of those beings which would come to be known as vampires stalked the sands of Egypt, slipping into the homes of the unwary, there to steal not blood but breath – for the old stories tell us that it is the breath, not the blood, that is the life. Versions of these creatures can be found all the way across the African continent, carried by travellers across the centuries, right down to its southern tip. In the opening scenes of Jaco Bouwer’s sinister new cinematic tale, we see an angular figure, clothed all in black, being borne across the desert in a littler, and all those centuries of ancient horror are remembered, somehow, in that deceptively fragile frame.

When the story proper begins, we are far from that timeless place. The year is 1901. There is war in South Africa, the descendants of Dutch settlers and Englishmen killing each other over access to the treasures of somebody else’s country. Inside a tiny hut on a muddy strip of land, where a time-ravaged woman (Michele Burgers) tends to a seriously wounded general, there is another kind of treasure, the kind which inspires traumatised soldiers to forget their orders and do still worse things. Annie (Jamie Lee-Money) looks about 16-years-old, with soft features, wide eyes and skin like milk, an unnatural beauty in this hellish place. one would think that her mother would hide her away. On the contrary, in anticipation of company she cleans the girl up and clads her in a frayed but still flattering dress. Then she straps her to a chair, cautioning her not to fall asleep in case she never wakes up again.

There is plenty here to set viewers on edge before the arrival of battered and bloodied young soldier Brand (Sven Ruygrok), who has come to see the general. After initially trying to avert his eyes from the supple figure of the girl, he becomes concerned about her situation. She is ill, says the woman. Won’t he sit with her awhile? Won’t he take care of her whilst the woman runs errands? The soldier resists. He recognises the temptations of the situation. He doesn’t want to be that kind of man. He is also unsettled by these behaviours which, though simple enough, seem quite at odds with how the world as he knows it is supposed to work. Perhaps he senses a trap, but there is a big difference between being aware of such a thing and being able to escape.

Far from the elaborate visual landscape of Bouwer’s last big screen work, the poorly plotted but nonetheless absorbing Gaia, Breathe In plays out mostly within the confines of a single room. It’s an intense three-hander which, though it could do with a bit of tightening up, nevertheless succeeds in creating and maintaining a chilly atmosphere of the sort rarely found in modern cinema. This is in large part thanks to the actors, who inhabit their roles fully. Burgers gets the most dramatic material but Ruygrok does a lot with the difficult role of a man who seems to be perpetually off balance. Lee-Money, who bears a curious resemblance to the young Sheryl Lee, evinces nothing but sweetness most of the way through, but there’s a power behind that. Annie has her own awful burden, which in due course she will be forced to reckon with.

Despite the limitations of the location, the cinematography by Jorrie van der Walt, who previously partnered with Bouwer on Gaia, gives the film a mythic quality. A set piece featuring an injured horse will stay with you, but the simple spaces within the hut acquire a depth of shadow and form which contributes strongly to that visceral unease. Lee-Money, meanwhile, is given the soft glow of a silent movie heroine, as if she were a figure out of a dream. It’s easy to see how Brand is drawn to the girl, in spite of everything. Does she feel the same way? Is this the familiar cinematic light of love, or something else?

It’s not complicated. It’s not really very hard to figure out, but it makes an impact nonetheless. We are told a lot of things which may or may not be true. The hut provides a brief respite from the war, but feels like a microcosm of such conflict. Shiny things dazzle, exciting passions, inspiring dreams, but in the end, it’s all about survival. Men wage war and women do what they must. To the very last breath.