Nightingale (2014)

What an incredible performance from this outstanding man, David Oyelowo! Clocking in at just 80 minutes, the story unfolds as more of a one-man stage show, and while I would not necessarily class this as a typical psychological thriller or a horror film, there certainly are elements of both here. Straddling these three genres so creatively brings a rather hallucinatory quality to it the film as we are drawn into Peter’s hellish bubble of isolation and ultimate unraveling.

Even though it is never entirely clear what events transpired to put our protagonist in isolation, it almost doesn’t really matter. The story is not the point here so much as it is a study in loneliness, the disparity between respect for active-duty soldiers and near complete apathy towards veterans, the trauma of religion versus sexual and gender identities, and the struggle of balancing personal versus family dynamics.

The audience is encouraged to be voyeurs less than they are active participants, joining the supposed ranks of our protagonist’s online viewers, caught in a tangled web of empathetic emotion and predatory consumption. But how much of this character’s story is true versus what is perceived, and are the limited off screen players really in existence or are they merely conjured by a struggling soul unraveling before our very eyes? I can’t really say for sure, but I do know that after almost 2 years of roughing it through pandemic isolations and lockdowns, this fine piece of artistic cinema is more relatable than it should be.

Are we really content to sacrifice so many lives continually due to political and societal pressure? What does it mean to be human? What does it mean to be alone? How would our lives change as a collective if we showed more empathy? These are the emotional musings I am left pondering after this tour de force show by Oyelowo in Nightingale, and I feel I perhaps will be all the better for the experience.

(Now streaming on HBO Max.)

TW: death of a loved one, dead bodies, mental trauma, ptsd, soldier returning from military duty, talk of abusive households, homophobia, religious trauma, mental illness, guns, off screen implied police violence, intense loneliness and isolation, etc

Review by Ellen Avigliano
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