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‘We Strangers’ Review: A Wry, Socially Conscious Study of a Cleaning Lady Who Pretends to Be Clairvoyant
Anu Valia shows signs of a bright future with 'We Strangers,' a wry, socially conscious study of a cleaning lady who pretends to have psychic powers.
After honing her craft directing prestige TV shows such as “The Afterparty” and “Shrill,” Valia makes an aesthetically striking feature debut that may impress even more with the clear eyes she brings to the trickle effect of privilege, envisioning the ability to say no as a luxury that those toiling away in the lowest rungs of society simply can’t afford. The score from Jay Wadley brilliantly serves to bring these worlds together when the clarinets of one realm start to coalesce with the percussion in the other, yet the film otherwise keeps them separate, much as Rayelle struggles to do, until the center doesn’t hold. When any film taking on race and class concerns runs the risk of being wearisome, “We Strangers” proves invigorating as it captures the distance between people of different social strata and closes the gap on the dizzying individual experience of navigating America as a minority.
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