Premature
This is a beautiful story. Just wonderfully told and observed. Filled with empathy and honesty. I’ve seen this form of coming-of-age story before, many times, but what director Rashaad Ernesto Green and his co-writer and star, Zora Howard, do is simple, and let the emotions flow.
Ayanna, Howard’s character, is the focal point here, and she’s spending this summer in Harlem before she goes off to school with her friends, and living with her mother. She writes poetry, which gives us an extra window into her mind, and enjoys the time with friends and family. One day, she’s out, and she meets Isaiah (Joshua Boone), an aspiring music producer that just came into town. They immediately connect, and start to spend time together regularly. As the summer progresses, we wonder what effect this summer romance will have on Ayanna, and what it means for her plans moving forward.
The characters are why “Premature” makes an impression. Ayanna’s emotions are laid bare, even when she doesn’t share them with the characters, or through her poetry. When she chooses a specific dress, we understand it’s because of how she’s feeling about Isaiah after an old flame walks into his life unexpectedly. We understand why she doesn’t share news with people, and we understand why she feels free enough to stand, naked, in the open after a night she shared with Isaiah. It is her story, and Howard’s work is emotion and heart.
Isaiah is not as well known to us, even when the film becomes as much about him through their relationship as it is about her. We know enough to see how he is not so dissimilar to Ayanna. A music producer and composer, he’s been stuck on a particular song for a while that we wonder whether he’s going to be inspired to finish because of her; it’s a smart setup that doesn’t payoff in the way we expect. Music is an important part of the story here, but not in the way it usually is in films about singers and songwriters. The first night they make love, Isaiah stops to put on a record he wants to share with Ayanna; it makes the emotions of that scene all the stronger. We see Isaiah working with a singer in the studio, and it’s nice to see him in his element; the looks we get from Ayanna during that scene show jealousy, but again, how this scene plays in to the film later in unexpected and interesting. The score is by Patrick Cannell and Stefan Swanson, and it’s subtle and beautiful in how it brings this story into its emotional places as the film progresses. Music is our main window into who Isaiah is, and Boone makes him a character we care about, and hope will make Ayanna happy.
There were times when this felt like every other coming-of-age film you’ve ever seen, and it kind of ends that way, as well, although we have so much affection for Ayanna and Isaiah as characters it doesn’t really bother me. At it’s best, though, “Premature” feels like a spiritual cousin to Linklater’s “Before” movies, especially the first two, where young people have an instant connection, and then, have life challenge them in ways that make them wonder how real that connection is, and how they will move forward, and what that means for them in the future. The result is thoughtful, and as emotionally satisfying an experience as a movie might be in 2020.
