YOU MUST LOVE ME // "ASIA" // TRIBECA 2020 FILM REVIEW
ASIA is the kind of tearjerker that, in less capable hands, could go a number of very terrible ways. In the hands of writer/director Ruthy Pribar, it's handled beautifully, with a delicate balance between the extreme sadness of death and the joy of life. The film may be named after Asia (Alena Yiv), mother to a young teenager girl Vika (Shira Haas). However, the story is truly both of theirs, studying their lives with equal measure.
Asia is a nurse at a local hospital in Jerusalem. Perhaps because her day job requires her to be "on point" and have everything together, she tends to let loose once she's off, acting more like a teenager than her own daughter. She has sex in a car with a married colleague and drinks too much at a local bar, while her daughter Vika spends most of her time smoking pot and drinking at a skate park with her friend Natali (Eden Halili). She flirts with one of the boys there named Roy (Or Barak) and ends up bringing him home. She's drinking and making out with him until suddenly her mood changes and her body seemingly starts to shut down. Roy, ignorant that something could be wrong, coldly states, "I'm not into Virgins anyway" and leaves.
Vika, we learn, has a degenerative disorder and after a night of drinking too heavily, Asia rushes her to the hospital when it has a bad reaction to her medication. Even though Vika knows that she should be careful about mixing the two, she's also a teenager whose adolescence is being stolen away from her. She wants to live, even as her body is breaking down. Her motor skills have already started to be affected and soon, so will her breathing. The question of if the disorder will affected her fully isn't so much "if" but "when." Asia and Vika's relationship seems strained at first, but as the film goes on, it grows stronger and stronger, showcasing a bond that was always deeply there.
Due to her workload at the hospital, Asia seeks out help in taking care of Vika. She enlists a fellow trainee nurse Gabi (Tamir Mula) and his tenderness and care for Asia immediately catches her attention. As she sees how much Vika lights up when Gabi is around, she makes an unorthodox request from him that may cross one too many boundaries. She tells him, "There are things I can't give her that you can." It would be so easy to fall into melodrama, but Pribar keeps the film from every slipping into such treacherous waters. The entire film is handled with a loving grace, keeping the heartbreak real and the humanity apparent.
Both Alena Yiv and Shira Haas are extraordinary in their roles. As Asia, Alena is a bit of a mess but never makes you doubt how much she loves her daughter and would do anything for her. Yiv gives her such grace and sorrow, never asking for pity but always searching for more. Haas turns in a heartbreaking and stunning performance as Vika. Her pain and confusion is matched with her desire to love and Haas handles them all expertly. Also turning in a fine performance is Tamir Mulla, sweetly tender as the trainee nurse Gabi. ASIA is a beautifully tender film that does indeed head towards one hell of a wallop of an ending. In these capable hands, it never feels like a chore. It always feels like a discovery.
GRADE: A-
WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY Ruthy Pribar STARRING Alena Yiv, Shira Haas, Tamir Mulla, Gera Sandler. Selected as part of the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival