THE STORY – Anna cares for her aging parents in a fragile balance of meeting one another’s needs. When a Florida heat wave shatters their family and Anna’s routine, her future is uncertain until she creates a world where she can thrive.
THE CAST – Anna Sargent, Victor Slezak, Ali Ahn, Marceline Hugot & Shane Harper
THE TEAM – Liz Sargent (Director/Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 91 Minutes
In the opening minutes of Liz Sargent’s intimate debut “Take Me Home,” the Korean-American director establishes the tranquility of contemporary suburbia. Lulling the viewer into the stillness of an ordinary American neighborhood, Sargent delicately situates her camera within the unhurried movements of daily routine. The neighbouring ants crawl from their nests near the local pond, as the Florida palm trees sway in the wind. “Take Me Home” emphasises the normalcy of nature’s equilibrium, as it transitions into the quietude of middle-class America. Largely sustained by a diegetic soundscape, Sargent sparingly disrupts her intimate family drama with intense ambient tones to personify her protagonist’s experiences.
Sargent brilliantly sustains her drama in one centralised location, never leaving the picturesque suburban strip until the film’s enigmatic finale. Through the hushed rhythms of everyday routine, we follow Anna, a 38-year-old with a cognitive disability, who lives with her parents. Her mother, an aging adult, supports Anna as her primary caregiver. Sargent establishes their loving bond through scenes of on-screen care. Tempered at the cause of sudden change, the opening act establishes Anna’s restlessness before her routines are interrupted by family tragedy.
Told through a minimalist framework, Sargent limits dialogue in her understated drama. While “Take Me Home” occasionally stumbles with unnecessary argumentative exposition when introducing Anna’s older sister into the narrative, the film understands that silence speaks louder than words. Unfortunately, unlike its skillful script, the film’s rudimentary blocking is largely indebted to the three-hander’s lackadaisical convenience. Except for one scene that personifies sensory overload through wide lenses and image distortions, Sargent’s mise en scène is fairly substandard compared to her nuanced screenplay.
On the flip side, Ian Holden’s editing spotlights Sargent’s efficient screenwriting through his limited, purposeful cutting. The film’s reserved formal rigor emphasises its well-intentioned anti-ableist commentary. “Take Me Home” commemorates caregiving as an act of unabashed love, as the caregiver’s role shifts in the aftermath of Anna’s family’s misfortune. At its core, “Take Me Home” succeeds due to the believability of its pivotal performances. The heart of the film lies in its committed cast, which impressively renders the story through a naturalistic ensemble.
Sargent cast her younger sister, who shares the same name and cognitive disability as her protagonist. Behind the camera, accessibility was at the forefront of Sargent’s artistic undertaking. Anna was provided with a professional caregiver, an acting coach, and an on-set accessibility producer. Despite her career as a Special Olympics athlete, Anna’s compassionate turn as the film’s disabled protagonist offers an empathetic portrayal of everyday support needs. Her relevant political sentiments further punctuate Sargent’s intentions, as her story takes a dark turn in its depiction of the failing American healthcare system.
Refusing to indulge in misanthropic tragedy porn, Sargent manages to balance her drama with considerable compassion and disability destigmatisation. The film’s frank depiction of Anna’s sex life adds dimensionality to her character. It isn’t until the film’s ambiguous fairy-tale ending, where Sargent concludes her saga with a neatly wrapped finale, that the aesthetic contradicts her realist pastiche. The ambiguity surrounding the convenient ending is, regretfully, a narrative cop-out, settling for a more digestible, sanitised conclusion to Sargent’s intimate narrative. Despite the open-endedness of its conclusion, Sargent shies away from the brutal reality of her protagonist’s living situation and the ramifications of a broken system.
Largely sustained by its unabashed empathy and its cast of naturalistic performers, Liz Sargent’s directorial debut “Take Me Home” adapts her proof-of-concept short film of the same name with the best of intentions. While her directorial vision lacks originality, Sargent’s desire to illuminate the lives of American caregivers is an admirable attempt at empathy-focused filmmaking. She succeeds by spotlighting the lives of real people going through real issues without stigmatisation. “Take Me Home” examines caregiving by anchoring itself within the quotidian microcosm of American suburbia. By limiting its locations, Sargent skillfully scribes a moving story about embracing agency during a time of family turmoil. Where it lacks in formal originality, “Take Me Home’s” compassionate production embraces and enforces an anti-ableist rhetoric — simultaneously on-screen and behind the camera.
