The Novice

The lines between char­ac­ter study, psy­cho­log­i­cal thriller and sports dra­ma are blurred in Lau­ren Hadaway’s debut fic­tion fea­ture which focus­es on col­lege fresh­man Alex Dall (Isabelle Fuhrman) as she joins the row­ing team of a fic­tion­al North­east school.

As with every­thing else in her life, she has to prove her worth through hard work, which always results in her shat­ter­ing lim­its, expec­ta­tions and – often – her phys­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal well-being. As Dall – referred to by her sur­name accord­ing to var­si­ty sports eti­quette – trains in order to mas­ter this sport, she starts see­ing team­mates and social rela­tion­ships as obsta­cles to her suc­cess, at first as a solo row­er and lat­er as a team mem­ber once the girls have com­plet­ed training.

The appar­ent hap­pi­ness she expe­ri­ences when she’s around her teach­ing assis­tant-turned-girl­friend Dani, or when sur­round­ed by the sheer beau­ty of nature while out row­ing in the qui­et, misty hours of the morn­ing, is fleet­ing. And every­thing comes crash­ing down as focus shifts to the next com­pe­ti­tion, over and over again.

Had­away pre­vi­ous­ly worked in the sound depart­ment for the likes of Quentin Taran­ti­no, Zack Sny­der and Damien Chazelle, and her skill is as obvi­ous as the sweat pearling at Dall’s every pore. The sound design through­out the film shapes the nar­ra­tive, maybe in a more major way than the dia­logue or actions that unfold on the screen. The school mas­cot, a raven, caws and croaks as Dall push­es her­self past her lim­its. Tape rips between her teeth as she pre­pares rows of strips to cov­er her open wounds. The inte­ri­or of her body is turned inside out so we hear her every breath, heart­beat and rush of adrenaline.

Had­away paints a deep por­trait of men­tal strug­gles that soon over­flow onto the main character’s body, from the peel­ing bloody skin of her hands to her slashed ribs. Where can, or will, Dall draw the line? While we are kept on the edge of our seat, won­der­ing if she will ever cross the line regard­ing her team­mates, a line that would turn this film into a ful­ly fleshed hor­ror, the only per­son she tru­ly hurts is her­self, in more ways than one.

“You do it not because it’s easy but because it’s hard”, Dani tells her dur­ing one of the most intense scenes. Her obser­va­tion turns out to be the most res­o­nant and truth­ful state­ments of the film. Dall reach­es for beyond the stars not because she wants to, but because she has to. Prov­ing your­self as wor­thy among sil­ver spooned or just plain lucky peo­ple, when com­pul­sive obses­sions crawl inside your brain like the crab we see in flash­es through­out Dall’s jour­ney, is not a want but a need. It’s survival.

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