Heel is a high-concept film with a premise that would’ve made for a compelling Shirley Jackson short story, but it’s distinguished by its fluidity of genres. There’s a temptation in thrillers to start with the familiar before a transformation into the discomforting and the disturbed, but that isn’t always effective if the set-up isn't plausible. Heel is the opposite; the film’s opened as a disturbed hostage thriller with sinister undertones before it’s revealed as an unusual, yet didactic psychological drama.
Writer/director Komosa is a Polish filmmaker who recently made the leap into English-language features with last year’s Anniversary, a political drama about the rise of a one-party movement in America. I enjoyed Anniversary for its clever dreaming device and strong performances, but it was clear that Komosa had drawn from an abstract version of American culture that was filtered through spotty anecdotes from the last decade; since Anniversary had to create its own recent history of political strife and the evolution of higher education, its reference points were more opaque. Heel is a more confined film that’s barely set outside of a secluded home, which is itself a place out of time. There’s a direct reference to Kes, the coming-of-age classic of the British neo-realist era, and the influence of Ken Loach’s melancholy depiction of family life is evident in the prolonged and uncomfortable moments Komosa is able to get out of his actors.
Heel doesn’t immediately announce what point-of-view it’s told from, but its first identified character is Rina (Monika Frajczyk), a Macedonian woman who’s found work as a housekeeper for an unusual family in the Yorkshire countryside. Rina’s the most sympathetic character in the film, and her presence as an outsider was a smart way to introduce the social dynamics in the isolated household. Chris (Stephen Graham) is an inventor of sorts with a jovial and compassionate attitude, and his aura of honesty is enough to make Rina ignore the troubling behavior of his mumbling wife, Kathryn (Andrea Riseborough), and the Howdy Doody-esque cheerfulness of his son, Jonathan (Kit Rakusen), who’s just old enough that it’s that he’s so clingy to his parents. What Rina isn’t able to ignore is Tommy (Anson Boon), a debaucherous 19-year-old who’s been chained up in the basement. He was involved in a drunk-driving accident before being “rescued” by Chris, who’s determined to cure his behavior through domestic indoctrination.
The story that unfolds is expected; Tommy’s forced to assimilate to the regimented upper middle-class protocol of his captors, who’d claim themselves to be his new family. The only hint that Chris might be devious is a threat to Rina regarding her immigration status and the home office, with the implication that he could reveal her legal transgressions if she were to speak up.
It’s this unspoken menace within Chris where Graham is able to shine; although I wasn’t a huge fan of Adolescence, Graham has built up good will by playing gangsters in everything from Boardwalk Empire and The Irishman to Public Enemies and Peaky Blinders. The brilliance of his performance in Heel is that it’s never entirely clear if Chris is putting on an elaborate front of manners to warp Tommy’s mind, or if he has a sincere belief in the sanctity of a proper family unit. There are a number of twists and turns towards the end of Heel, but this question is left open to interpretation.
The other great character choice made in Heel is to check all of the viewers’ biases by giving them the same amount of information about every character. It’s critical that the only footage of Tommy that’s set before his entrapment is shaky cell phone footage of an unhinged hooligan completely drunk at a bar harassing women. It’s enough to ask whether what Chris is doing is for a greater good, no matter how uncivil he is; at the least he’s willing to give Tommy a degree of respect, and the physical violence that’s exerted upon the young man is no more severe than the discipline that was commonplace in British households around the time that Kes was released. Tommy could be reformed if he was given therapy and treatment, but that’s an ideological argument that has no basis in reality; Chris’ radical program would almost be productive if it weren’t for a lurking motivation, revealed in the third act, that would point to unsubstantiated feelings of guilt.
Riseborough’s a similarly dexterous performer who’s given the most challenging role in the film; Kathryn’s a shattered woman whose ghostly existence is an unspoken shadow over the family. It’d be easy for her to come across as the vain, troubled housewife, but there’s an unstated power to a performance where she holds all the cards. If there’s any ironic detachment to the concept at the heart of Heel, then the desensitized omnipotence in Riseborough’s mannerisms is a reminder that these aren’t vapid puppets within a high-minded satire, but fully-drawn characters whose pain can’t be quantified. Riseborough is, like Graham, an actor who’s capable of complete transformations, and I can’t imagine any other actress of her generation bringing so much to a role that’s near-silent.