One of this year’s early Sundance premieres was also one of its most high-profile. Olivia Colman and John Lithgow headline the cast of “Jimpa,” directed by Sophie Hyde. It’s a film with ambition to spare and one that touches on some relevant queer issues, yet it ultimately never feels complete.
Colman stars as Hannah, a filmmaker whose new project will address her own family, including her father Jim (Lithgow). After years of marriage, Jim left his wife to begin anew as a gay man. When Hannah and her husband Harry (Daniel Henshall) decide to visit him much later in his life while he’s living in Amsterdam, they are a little surprised to hear that their 16-year-old non-binary child Frances (Aud Mason-Hyde, a trans non-binary performer) wants to stay for a year and spend time with their grandfather (Jimpa is the name Frances has given him, a combination of Jim and grandpa). Frances has a lot of admiration for Jimpa and feels spending time with him will be a tonic for their unhappy life back home and in school, where no one really gets them.
Hannah is cautious about the idea, and eventually, Frances has some awakenings of their own, both in terms of family and with one of Jim’s students, Isa (Zoë Love Smith).
This is clearly very personal material for the director, who co-wrote the script with Matthew Cormack. Mason-Hyde is also her child, making their big screen debut.
One of Hyde’s most observant notions is that Jimpa is not the person Frances thought he was. He is a bit set in his ways and not as understanding of a younger generation as Frances had hoped. Hyde stages some compelling scenes with Frances and Jimpa’s close friends around the table, at a generational divide about how they see things. Jimpa is particularly opinionated; he doesn’t believe in bisexuality and has problems with pronouns. Hannah has her own scar tissue about the relationship she has with her father.
With so much on its plate, the film never takes full advantage of its characters and where they all intersect. Sophie Hyde made one of my favorite films of 2022 – “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande,” which starred Emma Thompson as a woman who had never had an orgasm and hires a sex worker to hopefully remedy that. The director is big on character and bold in the themes she wants to address.
It’s refreshing to see the way she portrays a largely queer family here. By juggling so much, though, “Jimpa” loses focus. I’d much rather have seen more of the conflict between mother and father. Hannah’s husband is not much of a character, and a subplot involving the attraction between Hanah and one of Jim’s bisexual students is unconvincing.
Frances’s journey, while impactful for them, isn’t nearly as intriguing. The film also turns overly sentimental in its final 30 minutes.
What does make the movie work are its central performances. Jim/Jimpa is a fascinating character who decides mid-life to be the person he truly is. Having survived AIDS, he and his friends have become activists. This is one of Lithgow’s best roles in a while, and he’s very comfortable here, even appearing frontally nude a few times. Colman also brings her requisite complexity to the character of Hannah, struggling in several areas of her own life but trying to hold her family together.
Actor Kate Box comes in near the end as Emily, Hannah’s sister, and takes ownership of all her scenes moving forward. The film could have used more of her energy and confrontational push.
On paper, “Jimpa” seems like it should work, but the script never brings all the elements together. It’s best seen as a vehicle for Colman and Lithgow and a reminder of the dimensions they can easily bring to their work.
