On American Honey

American Honey is a document on contemporary America. It’s immediacy in style and performance is matched by its thematic relevancy. This is a broken, but beautiful America that Arnold has captured through the eyes of those that will either be its future, or have to survive in whatever the country becomes in the coming years.

There are a few professional actors throughout, with the rest of the cast hired based on their impromptu auditions and willingness to pack up and join the film crew. What Arnold is able to bring out of them with their lack of training is absorbing. There are moments of, what feels like, genuine authenticity in American Honey. As if we’re witnessing spontaneity and that is something so rare in cinema that the film becomes intoxicating.

This ability to draw you in is part of the film’s brilliance. The lingering camera, observing never intruding, positioned as if the unseen member of the travelling sales group. Yet, as intoxicating as American Honey is, it is also depressing as it explores the damaged, poverty wrecked, drug fuelled forgotten towns of America.  The hope in its young characters is negated by the reality of their situation and while the film ends with promise, and it would be nice to think that their path will be one of opportunity, the film begins with the abandonment of the young and this act haunts the rest of the narrative and provides apt commentary on certain political approaches to the post-university age.

The balance that Arnold finds between beauty and damage is handled with great skill and is one of the reasons American Honey lingers long in the mind after viewing. It is a film of right now, in theme and style. The 4:3 ratio reflects the edginess of the characters, allowing them to take centre stage and not get lost in the vastness of the American scenery, as well as setting Arnold’s film apart from other cinema releases. This is an important and stunning piece of cinema.