EIFF 2014: Violet

Violet opens with a silent act of violence, the murder of a teenage boy in an empty shopping mall, wordlessly captured from multiple angles on CCTV. After witnessing his friend’s attack, BMX bike aficionado Jesse (De Sutter) is left to grapple with the loss. He does so mostly by staring blankly at his parents in between aimlessly riding through suburban streets with his biker crew, the camera fluidly tracking from behind, capturing the beautiful pop of a red hoodie against autumnal trees, scored to the insistent low whir of shifting gears.

Languid and contemplative, Violet is full of exquisite painterly close-ups of faces and long, static shots of beautifully lit empty rooms. It’s formally engaging, particularly in its use of sound (and silence), but it’s also understated to the point of being comatose. A story about the tragic murder of a teen should have some emotional resonance, but Violet perhaps captures the daze of grief a little too well — it can hardly be coincidental that it literally ends in a fog. [Michelle Devereaux]