The characters in the family drama “Monica” are not a talkative bunch, at least not with each other. Monica (Trace Lysette) is a transgender woman who has learned, at great cost, what it means to be alone. She was expelled from her home by her mother, Eugenia (Patricia Clarkson), at a young age. Now she works as a massage therapist by day, and collects extra tips by doing video sex work. She endures with panache the indignities of other people’s interest, brushing off harassers with confident ease. Yet her most intimate moments consist of one-sided conversations. Monica makes calls to her absentee lover. She begs for a response, but her pleas go to voice mail.
Monica’s unhappy solitude is disrupted when she receives a call from her sister-in-law, Laura (Emily Browning). Laura informs Monica that Eugenia is very ill, and she invites Monica to the family home to reunite with her mother. Monica returns, but no one has told Eugenia that Monica is her abandoned child.
Monica allows herself to be introduced as a stranger, and she moves into Eugenia’s home. For most of the film, Monica acts as her mother’s caretaker. Eugenia is perplexed by her presence — she did not intend to get a hospice nurse. But despite Eugenia’s ignorance, the characters are drawn to each other. They are both women who carry themselves with a great deal of dignity, as well as pain.
The director Andrea Pallaoro doesn’t burden this delicate tale of reconciliation with long monologues or extensive back stories, and the performances are compelling in their restraint. Both Lysette and Clarkson are naturally magnetic actors, and they don’t waste the attention they’re given on excess sentimentality. They bear their characters’ burdens with little more than a furrow of an eyebrow. Monica and Eugenia face each other’s scrutiny, and both performers respond to the challenge by protecting their characters’ mysteries.
Pallaoro devises ways for his camera to amplify this feeling of examination. He shoots in a square aspect ratio, and this subtle technique gives the frame an entrapped quality. Monica and Eugenia are filmed in close-ups so tight that the image doesn’t seem to leave them room to breathe. Late in the film, Eugenia writhes in apparent agony over a pillow that is too hot. It’s to the credit of Pallaoro and his cinematographer Katelin Arizmendi that the air has seemed oppressively hot for hours before Eugenia’s complaint is made aloud.
As the ailing Eugenia gasps for air, Monica adjusts her bedding and holds her hand. Eugenia slips into silence. With assured performances and an equally assured camera, no one needs to speak to understand when the aches are soothed.
Monica
Rated R for nudity, sexual content and language. Running time: 1 hour 46 minutes. In theaters.
