“Pray For It really belongs to the year 2020 in a weird way…”
Unlike the daily news, feature-length documentaries often lag just a step or two behind the zeitgeist, often most useful at looking back on recent events or chronicling evolving situations. The year 2020 was full of documentaries that were filmed pre-pandemic while the 2021 release calendar showcased docs that would tack on a coda that featured the early days and months of COVID (The Gig is Up). It was only last year that we began to see docs shot during the pandemic, featuring subjects in masks (Unarchived) and enduring wave after wave of government-induced lockdowns (Big Fight in Little Chinatown).
Now in 2023, we may finally be reaching a point where we can look back more directly at the pandemic itself and the consequences of government and society’s response to it. In her debut feature documentary July Talk: Love Lives Here, neophyte director Brittany Farhat zeroes in on the titular band’s attempt to put on a COVID-safe concert at the unusual venue of an Ontario drive-in theatre.
It’s August 2020 and faced with a decimated touring season, Toronto-based indie rock band July Talk has decided to not go quietly into the COVID-night, but to gather their fans in a public health-friendly way at the Stardust Drive-In theatre just outside the GTA. Concert-goers are able to be socially distanced in their cars (some will face the stage, others aimed at giant screen projections), common areas will be diligently sanitized and masks will be required while indoors.
It’s a challenging enough set-up unlikely to break even, much less see any profit. But in addition to the anxiety over any key band members or crew getting a positive COVID test before showtime, there’s the additional health issues of co-lead singer and guitarist Peter Dreimanis having been recently diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes and forced to learn how to treat himself virtually over the phone with his doctor’s coaching.
But outside the ill-fated Fyre Festival, docs don’t get made about shows that don’t go on so the second half of the feature finds the band putting on a successful show including several extant songs from the set as well as some (socially distanced) audience interaction from co-lead singer Leah Fay Goldstein.
Love Lives Here does a decent job of introducing the band to the uninitiated, blending ample archive footage of earlier, happier times with the gruelling show prep and ultimately the concert itself. All of this is beautifully rendered in glorious monochrome. This reviewer admits to being a pushover for modern black-and-white images so credit to the credit cam ops and colourist Conor Fisher where it’s due.
Where the endeavour unfortunately stumbles is a curious disinterest in anything not happening on stage once the concert actually begins. There are plenty of first-class slider shots across various angles of the performers intercut with some killer drone footage showing the entire layout of the operation. What’s missing is any real sense of the audience. This show is a unique experience with mostly masked fans virtually tethered to their cars while carefully navigating the rules of socially distancing and sanitizing whenever they visit the restrooms or concession. Surely this was worth some b-roll?
The fans and support crew (roadies, staff) aren’t given any time on camera to express their thoughts on this unusual way of putting on a show and while we can assume they enjoyed it from all the cheering, theirs is a perspective that is greatly missed. Hell, we barely hear from most of the band members with leads Dreimanis and Goldstein sucking up most of the doc’s oxygen. While it can certainly be expected for the leads to stand out, it would have been nice to at least have a sense of who the other members are and how they dealt with the whole affair.
Love Lives Here is a curious cultural artifact, but ultimately an incomplete and disappointing one. A film that doesn’t know entirely what it wants to be or can’t commit to a vision is a film that often ends up pleasing no one. I for one might chalk this one up to inexperience, but there’s enough promise on display here that I may very well seek out Brittany Farhat’s next crack at the directorial bat.
5/10
July Talk: Love Lives Here is now available to stream on all major VOD platforms