A Screaming Man (2010)

“A Screaming Man,” Mahamat Saleh Haroun’s Cannes Jury Prize winner, does some things right, but the remainder of the film lags behind.

Set in Chad and made by a Chadian director, “A Screaming Man” is an accomplishment within itself. Films of the nation had never before found a spot in Cannes’ official competition, so a victory in the top three marked a historic moment for the history of Chadian cinema. Haroun brings understated dignity to the aesthetic of his homeland, juxtaposing grainy shots of barren desert locales and simple but carefully staged river scenes. He creates some artful and neorealistic moments in the film, and he makes it look less modest than the $2 million budget with which it was executed.

Adam (Youssouf Djaoro), a former swimming champion, has spent most of his adulthood at a hotel as Chad’s first pool attendant, a profession to which he has also introduced his son Abdel (Diouc Koma). The film opens with a shot of the two alone in the pool, swimming and playing in careless euphoria. The sense of peace fades when the water does, though, to reveal tensions between the two that arise when news of job cuts within the hotel threatens Adam’s future. His desperation to save his fate in the only world he knows and the only world in which he finds solace lead him to take desperate measures that force his son out of his way. These measures, in turn, begin to destroy the structure of Adam’s family and his life as a corrupt and war-torn government simultaneously decays Chadian society.

The moments shared between Adam and his family outweigh other parts of the film in visual and thematic terms. A collection of close-ups in a scene of Adam and his wife feeding each other watermelon, messy but sensual, focuses on the deep-set love between husband and wife. Their fingers tear out the pulp of the melon, and Haroun closes in on those fingers leading to the couple’s mouths. Haroun injects some of his most thorough editing into this sequence of shots, whose duration runs shorter than the majority of those throughout the film. His choice of edits adds an artful flair to a simple moment.

In a scene of greater suspense, Abdel and Adam ride a motorcycle as a shot using a telephoto lens follows them into the distance of the dark and the slow-fading light of the motorcycle’s front. Haroun parallels this fade with the increasing dimness of the relationship between the two and the questionable fate of both in their respective involuntary life changes. Later, Abdel’s girlfriend Djeneba (Djénéba Koné), who has become Adam’s surrogate daughter in Abdel’s absence, sings a mellifluous dirge as she lies alone in bed. Her solitude and sorrow run through the screen, especially when the camera shows Adam listening in from the next room.

With the exception of those special moments, however, “A Screaming Man” is a movie that centers on water but runs far too dry. Haroun exploits silence to a degree so high that I found it hard not to nap rather than watch “A Screaming Man.” The film fills the silent void in some night scenes with the sound of crickets, but the insects seem induced by the bore and lack of emotional attachment that the film provokes in the audience. Perhaps that explains the power of Djeneba’s song; it diverges from the otherwise distanced tone of the film, but not in a way that redeems it.

The moments of dialogue between Adam and his family widen the gap between the artful and meaningless components of “A Screaming Man.” When the family sits at dinner and Adam and Abdel refuse to acknowledge one another after a fight at work, Adam’s wife becomes frustrated. Her words suggest that she can’t stand or comprehend the silence, but her monotonous tone does not. As a foil to Adam, his wife adds no emotion to the oversimplified equation of the family.

Adam, whom everyone around him calls Champion, possesses a nickname that ironically contrasts his pathetic persona. The film implies that Adam’s worry motivates a slew of irrational and betraying decisions, but Youssouf Djaoro does not convey this emotion with strength. He appears lost and distracted rather than guilt- and regret-ridden, and his tacit patience often comes off as lazy acting on Djaoro’s part. He rarely shows those promising flourishes that would have made for a well-rounded and interesting character.

Haroun’s directing emphasizes this conflict, too. A shot of Adam sitting quietly at his new job and struggling not to fall asleep zooms in at snail speed. The shot would have lasting power were it not for its frustrating and drawn out length, which instead left me feeling Adam’s pain in the sense that I also couldn’t stay awake. The shot, albeit slow, creates a sense of immediacy in generating the desire just to see it end. Occasions like this one permeate the film, emphasizing the least intriguing parts of Adam’s days instead of the value of what good remains in his life, although the latter, I feel, is what Haroun intended.

While “A Screaming Man” glorifies the Chadian landscape and proves an honorable accomplishment on Haroun’s behalf, it has little redeeming value otherwise. The prettiest scenes do not save the film, as the empty silence and mediocre performances that also consume it are too big of a distraction. “A Screaming Man,” simply put, isn’t loud enough.

Directed by Mahamat Saleh Haroun; written by Mahamat Saleh Haroun; starring Youssouf Djaoro; director of photography, Laurent Brunet; edited by Marie-Hélène Dozo; produced by Florence Stern; released by Pili Films; running time 92 minutes