Lovers Rock review, Culture Whisper (LFF 2020)
There’s a scene toward the end of The Third Day: Autumn, the brilliant and baffling experiment from Felix Barrett and Dennis Kelly, where you mix with ecstatic dancers in a music festival for half an hour. Steve McQueen attempts a similar swaying aesthetic in Lovers Rock, another entry in his admirable Small Axe anthology showing London’s West Indian community during the 60s, 70s and 80s.
This film takes place over the course of one reggae-fuelled night at a west London house in 1980. You see all the prep beforehand: moving the living room sofa into the garden, wiring up the turntable and speakers, cooking an array of Caribbean dishes. A bouncer stands tall at the door, taking 50p entry fees. Certain characters drift in and out, like a hazy Robert Altman movie.
