Loving

Jeff Nichols directs with a certain aesthetic we've come to expect: that deep south setting and colour pallet of corn fields in autumn, and always the rural, backwater kind of community. Characters that seem to be talking sense are the outcasts, as with Mud, where McConaughey hides out as a hermit on the Mississippi river, or Take Shelter, in which Michael Shannon predicts a tempest. Based in part on Nancy Buirski’s 2011 documentary The Loving Story, and produced by Colin Firth, Nichols' newest feature tells the story of the Loving v. Virginia case, a 1967 Supreme Court ruling that invalidated the prohibition of interracial marriage. Mildred, a black woman, and her partner Richard Loving, a white man, travel out of state to marry but on return they are arrested, their union deemed illegal. Move out of the state, the court rules, or face prison time. They settle in Washington and raise three children, all the time trying to find a lawyer willing to represent them.

Joel Edgerton is almost unrecognisable as Richard Loving and that's largely to do with how he holds his face and arms. He and Ruth Negga carry much of the feature with very little dialogue, their devotion for each other expressed in silent nods and glances. Their performances are strong, but understated: neither has more than a few words at a time. Richard is a good-hearted stoic, undaunted by threats to his marriage but ultimately uninterested in the wider context of racial discrimination.

It feels like a simple enough premise, and even seems simplistic when it begins, but the film must be given the time to develop. Complexity surfaces as it becomes clear that the couple are pawns in a much larger game; the two civil rights lawyers are battling for a change in the US constitution itself. For all appearances Loving is the kind of film you are expected to applaud on ideological grounds alone. But it earns its respect with its performances (Michael Shannon’s Life photographer is a nice surprise), Nichols’ introspective direction and the periods of unendurable tension as the couple smuggle themselves across the state border at night. Loving lies apart from this year’s Oscar bait because it's not the feel-good film that many would expect: it is quiet and contemplative and deserves more attention than it will receive.