Departure

Andrew Steggall : 2015

Elliot is a wispy dreamer who, with his mother Beatrice, is packing up their French country house in preparation to sell it before coming back to England. There is a melancholic air to their efforts, with forced companionableness from Beatrice who insists on dinners with her distant son. Elliot takes breaks to wander into the local village bar, where he writes romantic poetry, wearing a vintage French army coat and eyeing up the rough beauty of local boy Clément. Clément is as natural as Elliot is awkward and they strike up an unlikely friendship. Elliot struggles with his nascent sexuality and increasing alienation from his mother. She in turn is confronted by the realisation that her marriage to his father is coming to an end. When the enigmatic Clément quietly enters their lives, both mother and son are compelled to confront their desires and, finally, each other. An intimate story beginning at dawn on the first day and ending at night on the sixth, charting the end of a summer, the end of a childhood and the end of an otherwise nuclear, middle class family. Andrew Steggall's feature debut premiered at London Film Festival 2015, and had its European premiere in the Alice nella Città section at Rome Film Festival 2015.