It's refreshing when a film decides not to drag on, as screenwriter and director Giuseppe Garau does in The Accident. For 65 minutes, Garau introduces us to Marcella (Giulia Mazzarino), a single mother whose life is falling apart. One day, arriving late to pick up her daughter from school, she's fired by her boss (who is also her ex's father and her daughter's grandfather), suffers a minor car accident with her daughter, and ends up losing custody.
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Through an ingenious formal trick that reduces the events to a single perspective, The Accident offers a dynamic, creative, and surprisingly funny experience, in which we see Marcella not so much climb to the top, but rather crawl through the mud, from humiliation to humiliation, only to emerge unscathed.
Director: Jeffrey Schneider
Writer: Luc Bernier
Stars: Jeffrey Schneider, Donna Hamblin, Cathy Loch
We quickly deduce this formal trick after the hellish opening sequence of Marcella's firing and car accident. Garau and cinematographer Giulia Scintu, shooting on 16mm with a low budget, film everything from the same position on the opposite side of the car, framing Marcella in a superficial close-up for almost the entire film.
Following the accident, a conversation with the tow truck driver inspires Marcella to devise an unconventional method to recover financially and see her daughter again: she buys an old tow truck and attempts to run her own car-picking business. It's a simple setup that perfectly complements the self-imposed restrictions on the camera; the use of close-ups and the car interior enclose Marcella, while the constant driving means we never get a moment's respite. It doesn't take long to grasp Marcella's psychologically exhausted state and the precarious situation she finds herself in.
The decision to film inside a vehicle invites comparisons with David Easteal's 2022 feature, The Plains, which is also filmed almost entirely from the back seat of the protagonist's car. But while Easteal relies on a static camera with long takes, Garau films handheld and uses abrupt cuts. The Accident resembles the familiar style of social realism popularized by the Dardenne brothers; it's surprising that the film is more of a dark comedy than a tense drama.
However well-intentioned and sincere Marcella is, her naiveté about the work she's taken on gets her into trouble. As she tries to establish her towing business, competing drivers intimidate, harass, and attack her to force her out. These moments, though grim, elicit laughter from Marcella's stubborn ignorance. ("We're in Italy. It's a civilized country," she says just before a dramatic cut proves her wrong.) And as she finds ingenious ways to gain the upper hand over violent competitors, it's easy to root for her.
Without going into too much narrative detail, Marcella finds a solution: convoluted and unethical, but one she accepts. With this development, Garau underscores a crucial point about how capitalism degrades people, forcing them to employ any means necessary to make ends meet.
It is here that the limited scope of The Accident proves invaluable: the immediacy of the plot and action allows its themes to unfold alongside the film without overwhelming it. A short runtime could make the film seem too lightweight for its own good, but The Accident is an entertaining and compact work that operates on its own terms.
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