MIDWEEK

Some films just sit up and beg to be mocked, but I hope Charles Teton's Dark Summer, a first feature produced, written and directed by this brave British film maker, doesn't get too much of a manhandling from the assembled throng of cynics who make up the critical fraternity.

It's a bleak little parable about a young black boxer who falls for a white girl, gets into trouble with her father, goes to live with her happily but faces despondency when the baby she is carrying has to be aborted and the relationship is virtually destroyed as a consequence. Added to that, Abe loses the amateur title he fights for and then, after turning professional, looks to have an uncertain future there too. The Film is quietly eloquent, with very sparing dialogue and a photographic, style that specializes in long, often almost mute takes. It is rather like the diary of a very ordinary life that looks hopeful and then goes wrong.

It's all so taciturn and sparing in it's drama that you sometimes have to guess what is going through the minds of Steve Ako as the boxer and Joeline Garner Joel as his girl (both good). But though it's actual drama is limited and sometimes limiting, the whole thing carries with it a truthful and believable atmosphere and very few false notes indeed. Dark Summer may be more of a calling card movie, than one which will get all that many people to watch it. But if it is, I hope people who matter in the business will see in Teton a newcomer of considerable promise who not only has a real eye but is also determined to seek out present realities in an original and daring way.

Derek Malcolm