Distant Voices, Still Lives - Terence Davies (1988)

There are films that are special to you. Distant Voices, Still Lives is very special to me. Not only it's the kind of film I want to make but also it's takes me back to the time of my life when I first saw it. Rewatching it didn't upset me as much as I thought it would but it still reminded me of better times. Particularly because it's a film about memories.

You could say there's no linear narrative of this film, but there's still a story. Or stories. Through memories (the director's own memories) you build up a story. We don't know these characters completely, we just share their memories as if they were our own. I think this is how we can empathise with them. 

I like to describe this film as a photo album where visually everything is very still, not a lot happening, but very beautiful and poetic too. On the other hand, the sound is alive, it's dynamic, it's got more colour and life than anything else. The use of music is so good because it's not just a musical but a film where music paints the atmosphere. Sound and music convey emotions just like in memories (or dreams). Unlike most films, music here isn't a resource for the audience, it's a resource mainly for the characters, it keeps them together, it keeps them alive, it keeps them going with their life (rather than keep us entertained with a film)

Pete Postlethwaite is superb. He's only in half of the film but the central character of most of it. He's  authoritarian father but he also has a tender side, his children are frightened of him but they also love him because he is their father. The best sequence is when they are getting ready for Christmas and he shows he cares for his children... but then he also can't contain his own anger and throws away the Christmas table. The range of emotion an actor has to handle to portray all this is impressive.

My favourite scene is the one where there's an air raid during WWII. The children are out in the streets while everyone else is running to hide in the shelters. The parents are scared because they don't know where they are. After escaping bombs they arrive and are met by the father who screams and slaps the older girl. After that he asks her to sing and she starts with a little voice to be joined by everyone else.  When you see something like this in a film you know it's happened to someone, you know it comes from someone's past. It's got so much emotion and sensitivity.


Distant Voices, Still Lives is a film that makes you want to write about it. But it's also a film that can't be described in words. It's an emotional experience.