Hall’s film puts us in a world of in-betweenness, in multiple ways. But she deftly insinuates herself into the lives of both Irene and Brian, who’s initially dismissive of her but slowly comes to value, possibly even love, Clare. Not surprisingly, he’s also repulsed by Clare’s self-hating charade. Irene is married to upright doctor Brian (André Holland), who has a clearer sense of the nation’s innate white supremacy, and wants to move with their two sons to another country. (Daughter of legendary British theater director Peter Hall, Rebecca Hall comes from a mixed-race background on her mother’s side, something that was never really discussed when she was growing up.)Īfter encountering Clare, and repelled by her charade, Irene tries to avoid contact. Watching the movie, we sometimes feel as dislocated as the two main characters. But as the Netflix film continues, adapted by Hall from Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel, what seems a weakness proves to be a deft and intentional choice. There’s a woozy, hushed, disorienting tone to these opening minutes of Passing, and you might worry that first-time film director, actor Rebecca Hall, is simply clumsy with her technique.
She’s even married to a Nordic, cheerfully racist man named John (Alexander Skarsgård), who has no idea he’s married to a Black woman. There she encounters a half-forgotten childhood friend, visiting from Chicago, Clare (the always great Ruth Negga), a vision – in the film’s black-and-white palette - of creamy, blond luster.
Wilting from a summer heat wave, Harlem resident Irene (the luminous Tessa Thompson) seeks a cooling beverage in a tearoom in the mainly White midtown of 1920s New York.
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