"The Pass" is based on a play by John Donnelly, was lately made into a movie by Ben A. Williams and deals with the subject of sports (in this case football) and homosexuality. One should know that before watching the movie. Those who expect explicit sex scenes between excited gay guys are totally wrong here. The film offers the finest of actors cinema, is more of a chamber-like psycho-study and can not muster with action scenes. But if you get involved with the psychology of the characters, the film becomes an experience. The story spans a period of ten years and begins in a hotel room in Romania. Two young footballers, Jason (Russell Tovey) and Ade (Arinze Kene),are really excited the night before their first big Champions League match, make a lot of nonsense and prepare for the match. And suddenly without any warning Jason kisses his mate Ade. This kiss will completely change and determine their relationship and their lives over the next decade. And as the story begins, so it ends, in a hotel room, where the two friends meet again. Director Williams filmed the entire story in just one or two rooms. This sometimes claustrophobic tightness is intended to illustrate how trapped Jason is in his life, from which he can not break out and free himself. Williams tells us with his story that the alleged winner is sometimes the bigger loser. And to the viewer (our society), the director wants to convey that if we were finally ready to accept people as they really are, tragedies like Jason's would be avoidable. The most tragic thing in the end is that Jason does not manage to change his life. Though completely devastated, he does not manage to jump over his shadow and remains lonely. He will live on as before, trapped in his own hell - to the bitter end. On the question of the friend which intent was hidden behind his behavior on the fateful night ten years ago, Jason can only answer incapable: "I don't know". But that is not the truth. We learn what the true intention was when we watch the last scenes of the movie, where is shown what happened after the kiss...(and only then we understand it correctly, because for a few seconds we discover the real Jason and that is deeply touching).
Russell Tovey is undoubtedly the unlimited star of the movie, an outstanding actor, but unfortunately completely undervalued internationally.
He lives openly gay and deals with this fact in his work for a couple of years. In the UK, he seems to have no major problems with this, but internationally (lets say Hollywood) it is still not trusted that gay men could play heterosexual love scenes. He has often proved how well he is capable of doing so. Unfortunately, big international roles, which would suit him, are not offered to Russell. What a waste of talent !
Russell Tovey is completely absorbed in his role, you can say he lives it out. He has his best scenes towards the end of the film, as the facade of Jason begins to crumble, e.g. when Ade asks him, "Now that you need me, you want me to stay with you?" and Jason answers with a tearfully voice: "You're the last thing I remember of any value", then one feels such a strong intensity and deep honesty that one asks oneself very moved, how one can play this so convincingly. If "The Pass" was not an independent movie and had been produced on a big budget and started in cinemas nationwide with 400 copies and then worldwide, Casey Affleck would probably have lost out at this year's Oscars. As in the film, here we have the proof that the best one is not always the winner and those who earn it are often left out. Encore Russell, encore...
Review of The Pass
