LFF 24: Ellis Park
★★★★★ | Heartbreaking beauty
Warren Ellis's music meant so much to me in my youth. In my teen years, it provided comfort to someone uncomfortable in their skin. It gave a sound to the devastation.
But I don't know Ellis. In fact, for years, I couldn't pick him out of the crowd. I knew his distinct sound, and how it made me feel.
Sitting down for Ellis Park, the new documentary by Justin Kurzel, I expected a traditional portrait of an elusive artist. Instead, I found a vital, heartbreaking story of people working to make a difference in an inhumane world. It is a majestic film about the vastness of life, music, and our need for connection.
As a story, Kurzel's film is elusive. It moves from one story to the next without warning; weaving together disparate parts into a cohesive whole that doesn't feel like one until late into the third act. There are the memories of Ellis's childhood, his drug and alcohol-fueled years, and how he found an escape in music.
Then there's the animal sanctuary he and his wife founded in 2021, which Ellis has yet to visit at the start of the documentary. There, we have the story of Femke den Haas, who eloquently speaks of the horrors trafficked animals face daily. It's this part of the film that proves hardest to watch. Kurzel refuses to shy away from showing the effects of animal cruelty, or the immense heartbreak of a young monkey holding onto their dead mother. In the background, Ellis's mournful music plays on.
It's not until the halfway point we realize where Kurzel is going with this. It's all connected. Ellis speaks of his mother's dementia, their shared compassion, and how he has lost and found meaning. There's a sense that the sanctuary is a means of making another connection on a larger level to life itself.
There are hypnotic images throughout. Lights flash through the night, illuminating Den Haas, then the animals, and in these moments I can't help but wonder how blind we are to ignore the souls in their eyes. When Ellis finally arrives in his park, it's a moment so full of life and love that it hurts. Yet Kurzel never goes for schmaltz. Instead, it's like everything else in the film: Honest and painful.
Ellis Park is intimate on a level I did not expect. At times, it's almost uncomfortable. Ellis speaks openly and refuses to paint himself in a flattering light. He doesn't apologize or make excuses; that's not what we're here for. We've come to understand, and we receive that in spades.
It's a profoundly moving film of an artist looking at another and uncovering the person behind the act. It left me an emotional wreck by the end. I felt a deeper connection to not just Ellis, but myself. It is part Kulesov, part something else I don't have the words for.
I still don't know him, but I understand the emotions that drive him. Those are familiar demons. Between us is the gulf of age and distance that echoes with his music.