re:mote voices

Title: Trauma

Cast: Colin Firth, Mena Suvari, Naomie Harris, Tommy Flanagan, Sean Harris

Director: Marc Evans

Director Mark Evans came to the world’s attention with the release of his film My Little Eye, which provided a twist on the classic kids dying at the hands of a killer genre. He returns with another challenging and interesting thriller in the form of Trauma, which sees Colin Firth as a man waking from a coma to piece together the tragedies of his life.

From the base line of Trauma we are presented with two deaths. Firth’s wife has died, but this is overshadowed by the murder of a well known singer. As the film goes on Firth finds himself continually unbalanced – what is real, what is not? What part did he play in either of the deaths? The arrival of the land lady Charlotte, played by Mena Suvari, provides some kind of light, some kind of guidance, playing off her new-age kind of spirit. This is contrasted by the police officer questioning his interest in the dead singer, and reinforcing the idea that he did actually know the dead woman.

Trauma works on various levels, both in a narrative and visual sense. Narration comes from the day to day events, but mixed into that are also a series of distressing dreams, and conversations with a psychiatrist exploring his memories of what is going on. Visually the film early on creates the sense of the unreal space – the building that Firth lives in taking on a certain persona of a haunted environment. The building is filled with junk filled rooms, plastic sheeting, CCTV cameras, and walls covered in writing. Which in some ways could be seen as a clichéd environment, intended to play with the mind – but explanations are provided for this, which aid the overall picture. Another part of the environment, which makes for a subtle reference is that early on we see that Firth lives in room 213 – a flat number which is associated with Jeffrey Dahmer. Additionally the use of CCTV cameras provides occasional bursts of stuttered and alternately visual material, which partly reminds of My Little Eye. The dream sequences are obviously another territory to play with visual structures, and are put to good use, particularly in exploiting the characters ant-farm.

Trauma explores a variety of themes. Perhaps most obviously the traumas of loss, but in that the part memory plays in the construction of events. Another key theme is the undertone at work throughout the film, that of celebrity and the level it is held up to, especially upon the death of the person in question. One of the films most effective scenes joins the idea of memory and celebrity, and in doing so provides one of the parts with the most impact – that where Firth stumbles onto the police re-enactment of the singers last known movements – there is something really effective about the way this is executed.

In many ways Trauma is a conscious attempt at head fuck cinema. Which to a large degree it succeeds at being, though perhaps it would be a greater and more intense experience if in the end film makers didn’t have to play to an audience demanding the right to be able to understand a plot.