THE ASSESSMENT (no distrib); It seems initially as though Fleur Fortune’s feature directing debut The Assessment will be easy to peg. The script, by John Donnelly and the duo credited as “Mrs and Mr Thomas”, appears to fall neatly into the subcategory of sci-fi as social commentary a la The Handmaid’s Tale. In a future ravaged by climate change, scientists Mia and Aaryan (Elizabeth Olsen and Himesh Patel) will only be allowed to have a baby if government assessor Virginia (Alicia Vikander) approves them as acceptable. What follows, though, is stranger and more provocative than you’d expect. The process requires Virginia to move in with the couple for a week, and she begins by asking the standard type of intrusive bureaucratic questions. Quickly, though, she veers into bizarre role-play, “becoming” their child as an abruptly shifting baby, toddler, and adolescent and forcing Mia and Aaryan to “parent” her. That’s only the beginning of a testing regime designed to challenge the couple on all levels, calling into question not only their capacity to take care of a child but who they are as human beings. The aperture of The Assessment widens throughout until the examination becomes existential and makes Mia and Aaryan wonder about their marriage and their entire society. Fortune, who had previously mostly directed music videos, has a keen eye for the visuals, and The Assessment is expertly stylized on a low budget, with incisive cinematography by Magnus Jonck, production design by Jan Houllevigue, and costumes by Sarah Blenkinsop. A confined story like this, though, stands and falls with its cast, and the trio of leads is splendid. Olsen and Patel cycle unerringly from nervousness to puzzlement to sadness to fury. Vikander, though, is the revelation here, superb as she handles every extreme requirement in Virginia’s playbook, physically remarkable and in the end surprisingly human. The scale of The Assessment, as well as its overall weirdness, will likely limit its popular appeal, yet it sticks a satisfying landing that incorporates psychological acuity with novelistic world-building.
ROAD DIARY: BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN AND THE E STREET BAND (Hulu/Disney – Oct. 25): Springsteen and his band are now in their sixth decade of performing with mostly the same line-up, and while that may still make them newcomers compared to the Rolling Stones, they’re very aware of how old they are. Road Diary, directed by Thom Zimny (he’s been working with Springsteen and the band for 20 years himself), follows them on their post-Covid worldwide tour, their first in years. Although Road Diary is inevitably dominated by Springsteen as the headliner (and also the narrator), the film is structured around the band, and it’s the musicians and the behind-the-scenes personnel who appear as the on-camera talking heads. There’s plenty of thrilling concert footage, and some fascinating clips of the earliest days of the band back in the 1970s, as well as a healthy amount of insight about the way Springsteen structures his set list and his philosophy about what makes their shows work. Interspersed with that, though, is an undercurrent about aging, mortality, and change. Two of the foundational members of the E Street Band, Clarence Clemons and Danny Federici, have died and had to be replaced, and Springsteen made the creative decision to bring in a chorus and horn section for the tour, so their integration with the longtime veterans is part of the film’s text. That elegiac tone, and the recognition that time is moving on and only travels in one direction, gives Road Diary a bit more weight than the usual tour documentary.
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