Short Film Review: Harley Chamandy's "The Maids Will Come On Monday"
20-year-old writer/director Harley Chamandy’s second short feature, The Maids Will Come on Monday, brings the family tension that builds during the holidays to a sizzling conclusion. This understated short about estrangement, loneliness and family is well worth your attention.
A haughty family dines on takeout for Christmas dinner while spiraling into amusing and intimate disintegration.
Watching The Maids Will Come on Monday (or Chamandy’s previous short, The Final Act of Joey Jumbler, which you can watch here), you would not suspect it to be the work of a filmmaker who’s not even old enough to legally drink. But that’s the magic of both of Harley Chamandy’s shorts; they sneak up on you with their meticulous, yet understated style and charm you with their surprising depth.
At only 20 years old, Chamandy possesses a staggering maturity that’s well beyond his years, which is probably one of the reasons he was selected to participate in Black Factory Cinema’s workshop with filmmaking legend Werner Herzog in Cuba (where he was the youngest filmmaker). He exhibits a real knack for delivering the kind of stories that get you to think through their presentation and design, and he shows a lot of talent for creating intriguing situations that reward patient and attentive viewers.
With Joey Jumbler, he channeled the real-life experience of his actor, Alain Boucher, to craft something that feels deeply personal while also commenting on the social politics of Quebec. Using a wealthy family to contrast Joey’s profession, nationality, and social status, Chamandy created a powerful juxtaposition that was brought to a softly emotional climax in its final moments. Similar to Joey Jumbler, Chamandy builds social class into The Maids Will Come on Monday’s DNA, but his exploration here is more focused on the hollowness its well-to-do characters feel. Where Jumbler examines the line that separates the rich from the poor, Maids takes sharp aim at the walls people of the same background build around each other, which inflict a deep sense of unbearable loneliness.
What starts as a pretty standard Christmas dinner slowly begins to unravel into familial disarray. We meet Julianne (Amanda Rydvald) and her family — minus her son, who’s absence is tied to a prior engagement with a friend (something that means more to him than family time) — as they arrive at her sister’s huge house, who she hasn’t seen in a long time. From its earliest moments, the lines that define characters and give them shape are present; even before they sit down for their sad (but elegant) take-out Christmas dinner (where their arrogance and disdain flow like never ending bottles of champagne), we are given a good sense of who everyone is and how they relate to one another. The well-defined characters make the family drama easier to follow and helps to better latch us to Julianne, whose inevitable breakdown gives way to a memorable and fiery conclusion.
Chamandy has a tremendous eye and shows a real aptitude for crafting engaging and well-tuned dialogue. His direction finds a nice balance between static and movement, which helps its dinner scene breathe while also building tension. The cinematography from Jeremy Cox gives the film a nice warmth and a tactile quality, with the editing from Diane Grandchamp giving the short a pleasant glide. With solid performances and an incredibly interesting ending, The Maids Will Come on Monday effectively examines the hollow, lonely feeling that resides within even the most well-off, and its use of the holiday setting as a backdrop lends an added layer of resonance to the overall experience.
Recommendation: Definitely give this short a watch! You can check it out right now on Vimeo and Film Shortage.
Rating: 4 spilled drinks outta 5.
Itching for more?! Check out the links below:
Where It’s Beautiful When It Rains review
Harley Chamandy on Where It’s Beautiful When It Rains
Harley Chamandy on The Maids Will Come On Monday
What do you think? We want to know. Share your thoughts and feelings in the comments section below, and as always, remember to viddy well!