“The Brink Of” - Film Review
For as long as bands have existed, there’s been a fascination about the interpersonal relationships among bandmates. The drama of Fleetwood Mac is decades old at this point, but it’s still discussed at length when a song like “The Chain” is played on the radio. Fleetwood Mac isn’t the only band whose love lives are the subject of pop culture scrutiny, but it’s this dynamic that’s at the heart of The Brink Of. Lena (Nicolette Norgaard) and James (Tim Hoffmann) are high school friends who have formed a duo called The Brink Of. They’re flying under the radar until one clip of a live performance rockets them to instant fame. Suddenly, everyone knows who they are. And then, just as quickly as they gained notoriety, Lena and James disappear. Now they’re together again for a weekend at a remote cabin to write their debut album, work through all their emotions, and figure out what exactly they mean to each other.
The Brink Of has glimmers of recent works like Daisy Jones & The Six and Once. It’s always compelling to watch two people work together creatively and use that outlet to process their emotions. Their songs can say the things they’d never admit in real life. For Lena and James, it’s decades worth of feelings they’ve never acted on. Part of the reason the clip from their live performance goes viral is because of the way they look at each other. People became obsessed with Lena and James, their lyrics, and what they meant to each other. It’s easy to see why they went viral, even if this is a fictional movie. There’s a crackling chemistry between the two leads. While the film is certainly a romance, it never feels outside the realm of possibility. The emotions and the relationship are grounded, earnest, and charming. It will make your heart ache for that person and the things you never said to them.
There are aspects of The Brink Of that are a little rough around the edges, but there are also moments of pure movie magic. There’s a roughly ten-minute, one-shot scene toward the end of the film where the camera is dancing through a house party that sees Lena and James going through a gambit of emotions. Exciting, complicated scenes like this normally can’t be accomplished in small-budget films, so its mere existence is something to be celebrated.
If one were to split hairs about the film, it’s somewhat jarring to see Nicolette and Hoffmann play the high school versions of their characters. It’s likely a choice that was made due to the limitations of the size of the film, but it is strange to watch these mid-to-late-twenty-somethings pretend to be eighteen-year-olds. The Brink Of is a love story decades in the making, so the film does need these scenes to establish the longevity of Lena and James’ feelings for one another, but it would have benefitted from younger actors taking on the high school-age characters.
The Brink Of is a sweet, small-scale story about how difficult it is to pursue a creative career and how lovely it is to go down that path with someone you care deeply for. Time and again, Lena and James tell each other that they’re on a metaphorical cliff and they have to jump to see what could be. But isn’t that the scariest place to be? To sacrifice the status quo for the unknown? It may break you or it may turn out to be better than you ever dreamed. The Brink Of lives on that precipice until its main characters finally leap and we learn what awaits them when they land.
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