There are overtones of "An Education" in "Fish Tank," which opens here today, but it's also fascinating to watch Andrea Arnold, another extremely talented woman film director, put a different, but equally powerful vision on a movie about a teen-age girl and a much older man.
Acting is a key factor, of course, and Arnold's primary cast of three women and two men perform with power and passion. Basically, movie belongs to Katie Jarvis, a 19-year-old portraying 15-year-old Mia to perfection. It's her first feature, and she shows the pain of a tortured adolescent, bounding from extreme joy to darkest depression in the flash of an eye. Mostly, she's in a dark mood, seeking — well, she isn't sure exactly what she's seeking, but whenever she gets close, it slips away, or she drops it, or she hurls it as far as she can.
Mia lives in one of those anonymous, ugly, public-housing projects with her dissolute, often-drunk mother, Joanne (Kierston Wareing) and a cute younger sister (Charlotte Collins) whose every other word would make parents of an earlier generation reach for the soap. Mia envies hip-hop dancers, practices moves here and there, sometimes in her room, sometimes in her dank, depressing neighborhood, like a schoolyard. She picks fights with her schoolmates. And yet, she struggles to free an aging, swaybacked horse from its chain. That attempt, however, brings her in contact with Billy (Harry Treadaway), whose dream is to restore a Volvo. These folks have rather low expectations–no Jaguars, much less Rolls-Royces, in their experiences.
And then Joanne, who seems to often follow a night of drinking by bringing a man to the house, brings Connor (Michael Fassbender). Unlike many of her late-night companions, he seems like a rather kind, caring person, and his acting is flawless and with fine range (he was the English movie critic in "Inglorious Basterds" and will portray Rochester in a new "Jane Eyre" next year). In a lovely scene, he takes all three of them fishing, though I think a journey in an automobile with that trio of harridans would be more than a person could stand.
What happens next is rather predictable, and it's followed by a scene that is too long and intense, the only time that Arnold loses some of her tight control.
This is a strong, terrific movie, only the second for Arnold and the first for Jarvis. Here's a chance to see some early work by people who could become household names.
"The Fish Tank" opens today at the Tivoli.
-Joe