Romas Zabarauskas’ Advokatas (2020) suffers from stilted dialogue, a lack of vision, and an unclear sense of style. Can it be an effective piece of activism regardless?
By Simona Zaunius
Kvosčiauskas and Yıldız as Marius and Ali / photo: Naratyvas
I grew up in a Lithuanian-American family. The nation of Lithuania’s attitude towards same sex relationships, as would be expected of any Eastern European-mostly-Catholic-ex-Soviet country, is abysmal. No legal recognition exists for same sex partnerships, either in civil unions or marriage and the approval rate for gay marriage in 2015 was at a measly 24%, the fourth lowest in the European Union. The country remains mostly Catholic and socially conservative. The cities of Vilnius and Kaunas harbor small queer communities, but access to specific Lithuanian Queerness is near impossible to come by when not in the country itself.
So when I found out that director Romas Zabrauskas had made a film centering a homosexual relationship, it was a big deal. Advokatas (2020) (“The Lawyer”) is Lithuania’s first film focusing on a same sex relationship between men. In it, a Lithuanian lawyer named Marius (Eimutis Kvosčiauskas) develops an attraction to bisexual Syrian refugee, Ali (Doğaç Yıldız), and develops a savior complex as he tries to get Ali citizenship. The film has its higher points, with Kvosčiauskas’ gentle performance being the main one. There is a scene where Marius and his group of gay friends gather around the table to have dinner together. It was beautiful to hear, as someone who grew up entrenched in Lithuanian culture, a language I’d always heard used negatively to speak of gay people now used to chat casually about homosexuality’s nuances and joys instead. To see a cam worker dance to Džordžana Butkutė’s, “Del Taves”, to mesh those two worlds of Lithuanian culture and queer culture, felt like exhaling a deep, held breath. It felt as if two entirely separate spheres had finally been pushed to a venn diagram, and the center now had a vision and a reality.
But as Marius’ father died and the first act of the movie came to a close, the pleasure I took in the film stopped. Once the novelty of the film wore off, it was difficult ignoring the lack of vision, stylistically and directionally. The score, characters, and general aura of the movie felt awkward and disjointed. Decent actors are curbed by abominable dialogue laden with as many awkward, meaningless pauses as there were lines. The dialogue is also delivered painfully slowly; towards the end of the movie I looked to see if there was an option to put it on 2x speed. By the time Marius and Ali realized their love and had sex, I found that I simply couldn’t get myself to care anymore.
Director Romas Zabarauskas participates in a variety of activist work, from establishing a map of LGBTQ+ friendly cafes in capital city Vilnius, to authoring a book titled Lithuania Comes Out: 99 LGBT+ Stories, a collection of ninety-nine stories from LGBTQ Lithuanians. Advokatas, more than a coherent story, seems just another piece in this activist puzzle. The film will hopefully open the door for more queer Lithuanian films and filmmakers in the future. But as a landmark in the Lithuanian film scene, it fails to connect.
Utilizing fiction as a means of activism requires powerful wielding of both emotion and empathy. Film has many moving parts that must come together; a script, visuals, music, and acting performances all must blend into a single piece of art. When done well, it can serve to both romanticize and normalize and to pull you into a world which you haven’t experienced. Seeing for the first time at age 14 an intense, burning love between two male characters in the divisive Call Me By Your Name (2017) was a formative moment for me. Not because I had never seen gay people on my television screen before, but because the characters, the story made it so that I couldn’t look away.
There is endless potential for queer stories. Those that hyper-focus on a specific queer person’s experience will often be some of the best. Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight (2016) is not only a queer coming of age story, but a look into the Black community of Miami, masculinity, and the tragedy of addiction. Through its glowing blue light, the main character Chiron’s sullen looks, and Nicholas Britell’s instrumental, “Edge of the World”, which feels like pure ascension, I felt deeply, irrevocably connected, despite being nothing like our lead.
The empathy and emotion that can be drawn from a good film is uniquely powerful. When the credits rolled on Advokatas, I was left simply mourning the lost potential of the work. If I, someone eager to watch the movie, couldn’t be bothered to care about Marius and Ali, then what will people who are indifferent or even against the message get from it? There is almost no queer Lithuanian media. It becomes desperately necessary that when we do get some, it works.
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