There seems no end to the vulturous nature of late-stage capitalism. Just when it seems every crevice of society has been mined for content, a fresh new subject crops up waiting to be explored. In this wintery cold noir from Karl R. Hearne, the subject is elder care facilities and the way they’re used to exploit the elderly and vulnerable while lining the pockets of the “guardians” assigned to protect them. This was also explored a few years ago in J Blakeson‘s black comedy/satire I Care A Lot. In The G, though, we see the perspective not from the guardian praying on the elderly, but from the elderly themselves – here in the form of the phenomenal Dale Dickey as Ann Hunter, a woman imprisoned in an elder care facility with her husband while their life savings are slowly drained away; a woman who decides to take matters into her own hands and enact revenge. The G initially feels as though it may promise to be a gender swapped take on the “geriaction” genre made popular by Liam Neeson‘s Taken movies; however, Hearne moves in a different direction, taking aim at the corrupt institutions which have enabled this situation as well as a character study and relationship drama between Ann and her granddaughter Emma (Romane Denis). It goes off into strange tangents at moments and perhaps suffers from a lack of coherence at times, but ultimately The G is an enjoyably genre flick which showcases Dickey’s ability as a leading actor.
No Country For Old Women
Gruff, chain-smoking Ann Hunter feels like a woman railing against the world. She feels past the point of caring what anyone thinks and you get the sense of a deep trauma in her life. She is so abrasive, in fact, that she sneers at the doctor who warns her she isn’t doing a good enough job looking after her husband Chip (Greg Ellwand). Ann clearly has had enough of people telling her what to do.
All of this is to the delight of her granddaughter Emma who finds herself drifting through life and aspires to her grandmother (who she nicknames The G)’s lack of shit-giving.
Soon Ann finds herself and her husband are forced into an elder care facility, their rights having been stripped by their government and granted to Rivera (Bruce Ramsay) a guardian who makes his living incarcerating the elderly and syphoning their income for himself. Rivera, it transpires, bribed Ann’s doctor into writing the recommendation which sealed Ann’s fate.
Emma is determined to rescue her beloved G from this fate and soon teams up with local landscape gardener Matt (Joey Scarpellino) to find a way to break her out. Ann has her own plans, however, and soon sets in motion a series of events which lead to violent and bloody retribution.
Perhaps the most impressive aspect of The G is its subversion of stereotypes in centring its story around a woman in her 60s who is both completely self-sufficient, and unapologetically complex and unlikeable. ‘I’m not a nice person’, she says at one point, and this is evidenced throughout. Ann displays moments of cruelty – a particularly brutal scene shows her shooting a young man in the head then, apparently not satisfied – shooting his corpse in the face twice more – and is antagonistic towards virtually everyone she sees. Hearne does not shy away from any this. Where other directors may minimise Ann’s impact, or leave something to the imagination, he arranges his camera in a static, no-frills way to emphasise the violence on display.
All of this takes place in a homogenous, anonymous state in America – rundown and grey. It’s a good metaphor for the bleak stage of broken economics on display in the United States, a place where even the elderly can be exploited for financial gain.
Standout here in Dale Dickey, who infuses Ann with a medley of anger and fear; equal parts strength and helplessness pour from Ann at any given moment. An early scene with Rivera is particularly worth mentioning, where Ann – once her husband is threatened – changes from crumpled hatred to raw, angry outbursts so suddenly it jolts you.
Conclusion
Occasionally it veers into an overly complicated and opaque narrative structure, The G is a fun genre thriller with an incredible performance by Dale Dickey.
The G is screening as part of the Glasgow Film Festival 2024
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