Loggerheads

Tess Harper gives a beautifully modulated performance as Elizabeth Austin, the adoptive mother of Mark Austin (Kip Pardue), in North Carolina filmmaker Tim Kirkman’s beautiful, richly layered Loggerheads. Of all the characters in this multi-location, multi-character, even multi-time-period film, Harper’s is perhaps the most complex and difficult—and the one with the most personal growth over the course of the film. She has lost her son due to the unbending moral stance of her husband, the Rev. Robert Austin (Chris Sarandon), over Mark’s gayness. The problem for Elizabeth is that she is very much a part of the same world as her husband—shocked by the idea of homosexuality to the degree that she stops dead in her tracks in her welcome to new neighbors when evidence suggests they’re a gay couple. Similarly, she’s disturbed by her freethinking neighbor’s (Ann Pierce) decision to display the brazenly nude statue of David in her front yard (couldn’t it at least be moved to the back yard?). Yet, Elizabeth grieves over the loss of Mark, and is less stiff-backed than the Reverend in other regards (she sneaks cigarettes at the kitchen door, carefully keeping the smoke outside). She also has to come to terms with her own feelings and beliefs—regardless of her husband—over the course of the movie. It’s a subtle, completely organic performance that helps to anchor the film. Loggerheads is such a richly detailed film—encompassing this story, Mark’s own story, and the search for Mark by his birth mother (Bonnie Hunt)—that no mere recounting of its plot in this space will do it justice. Kirkman and his cast and crew perfectly capture the dichotomy of North Carolina (Kirkman himself called the state a character in the film) as a combination of liberal acceptance and conservative intolerance. Even more, Kirkman does something rarely explored in gay-themed films—he presents gayness as being about much more than whom one sleeps with. A truly extraordinary work.

Director: Tim Kirkman
Producer: Gil Holland
Writer: Tim Kirkman
Cinematographer: Oliver Bokelberg
Editor: Caitlin Dixon
Production Company: 120db Films, Independent Dream Machine, LaSalleHolland, Loggerheads LLC, Strand Releasing
Cast: Tess Harper, Kip Pardue, Michael Kelly, Bonnie Hunt, Adrian Lee, Chris Sarandon, Ann Pierce, Michael Learned