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Waves is a drama/romance film directed by Trey Edward Shults and released in 2019. This A24 movie follows a family as they undergo severe tragedy and hardship, dealing with loss, hate, and forgiveness. I haven’t been this blown away by a movie since I first saw Parasite in 2019. Waves is an indescribable experience, and an incredible emotional journey. This film has not left my mind since I first watched it, and it has quickly become one of my all time favorite movies.
The visual presentation of Waves is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. As with the vast majority of A24 produced films, Waves has gorgeous cinematography. This movie is filled with so many beautiful shots and colors that it can be overwhelming both emotionally and visually. Waves uses these spectacular visuals to help tell its story and convey the emotions and mental state of its characters. Through the use of color, lighting, camera work, and changing aspect ratios, Waves constructs a visual language. This language helps to convey to the audience a character's inner thoughts and feelings without saying them outright. It also helps to transport us into their shoes and further immerse us into the film. During scenes where the characters are happy and carefree the aspect ratio opens up letting the shot fill the screen. Similarly to how overflowing positive emotions are overtaking these characters at this moment. This also opens the characters up to the audience, it's beautiful and comforting. However during tragic and darker scenes, the aspect ratio tightens, and those black bars begin to overwhelm the screen. This boxes both the characters and the audience in, and we can see how they feel trapped, cut off, and overwhelmed. To an extent, the audience feels the same way, unable to escape what's on screen.
Color works in tandem with the aspect ratio to further establish this visual language. During the films more happy, innocent, and carefree times the colors are very natural. The beautiful and vibrant colors come from the real world. Such as with the blues from the ocean, or the pinks of the sunset. However when things take a turn for the worst the colors become unnatural. The colors and lighting come from artificial sources. For example, the uncomfortably bright and violent flashing red lights at a party. As things spiral out of control this natural and organic color is gone and is replaced with something artificial and uncomfortable. This remains consistent throughout the entire film. Whether consciously or subconsciously the audience becomes conditioned to this, just as I was. Whenever flashing lights or harsh colors began to fill the scene I held my breath and feared for the worst. The use of color in Waves is used as effectively as in Perfect Blue. Not only does it paint a breathtaking film, but it sucks you in and doesn't let you go.
The sound of Waves is another way the film manages to fully immerse the audience. First of all, the actual soundtrack of the movie works very well. The songs fit each scene they’re in and they perfectly compliment particular beats in the story. They also work as a manifestation of the inner thoughts within different characters as well as their emotions. The original score itself is very effective and is now one of my all time favorites. It perfectly balances a calm, somber, and quiet sound, with something loud, overbearing, and heavy. For its quieter moments it uses lots of traditional instruments, the piano especially. This actually mirrors the calm and serene aspects of the ocean. The louder and more violent parts of the score are filled with electronic/synthesized sounds that overpower the film. Crashing into the characters and the audience, like waves. This is one of the first movies I’ve watched where I was truly impacted by the sound design. Specifically how, again, it manages to immerse the audience. Using very visceral sound effects the movie forces you to feel a character's physical pain. That sound design working with the lighting, the color, the score, and the performances, creates something so real it hurts.
The acting in this movie is on another level. Every actor and actress in Waves does a phenomenal job. They each display an incredible range of emotions. Kelvin Harrison Jr., Taylor Russell, Sterling K. Brown, and Lucas Hedges all do a particularly spectacular job. They manage to feel real in scenes where they have to show lots of emotion and when they have to show very little. I fully bought into each and every one of these characters. The characters in Waves all feel so real. They’re each fleshed out beautifully so that you get a great understanding of who they are, their relationship to one another, what they have been through, and how it affects them. The characters feel like real people, they feel like a real family. They are each incredibly flawed, they make mistakes and mess up, but they are incredibly relatable. They are incredibly human. This movie handles very heavy and mature material very well. This movie feels incredibly personal and I think that is because everyone can see a little of themselves in this movie, in one way or another. And much of this is due to these performances and the writing for these characters.
The story and plot itself is marvelous. Waves basically acts as a character study for an entire family. It looks at different family dynamics, and the conflict associated with them. It looks at the pressure put on teenagers, toxic relationships, loss, and much more. And despite all of that, it never manages to feel like artificial drama. This feels like it really happened, it feels organic and raw. This story manages to be incredibly tragic and sad, while also being incredibly uplifting and hopeful. This story at its core, is about family, love, hate, healing and forgiveness. Every aspect of this movie perfectly complements those core ideas. It is one of the most powerful, resonant, and impactful stories I have ever seen, and it is told perfectly.
I have no issues with Waves, this movie is a masterpiece. The pacing is perfect, the story is incredible, the characters are astounding, the cinematography is breathtaking, and the music is heart wrenching. This, to me, is a perfect movie in every single way. In the last 3 years I have seen 152 movies for the first time. Some of those movies I don’t like, some are just ok, some are pretty good, and there are some I really love. But there are a few movies in that list that are indescribable. They’re these awe-inspiring works of art that shattered my heart and mind when I first saw them. These are the movies that remind me why I fell in love with film. Waves is one of those movies.
Objective Score:
10/10
Personal Score:
10/10
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