Reflective Encounters

“The dilemma of modern dating is parodied in Miss Fortunate, Ella Jones’ melodrama on the grieving process. Scarlett (Molly O’Shea, who also writes) contends with nosebleeds, unanswered texts, and dying plants, but none of the above are as tough as the weeks following the death of her mother.

As family friends come to her ghostly home to console and help clear up, Scarlett can barely speak, let alone make important choices. Needing someone to help carry the coffin, she practices taking bra selfies to lure Tinder matches. When she goes to the funeral parlour, Scarlett distracts herself from the reality before her by drafting texts to suitors. Soft lighting emphasises Jones’ attention to detail. The dried lipstick on an untouched wine glass, the dirty draped shirts on a chair that compliments colours. The vividness of colour reflects the way that trauma sticks in the mind, and calls to mind the bold melodramas of Douglas Sirk or Pedro Almodóvar. Ben Whishaw appears for a scene as an unsympathetic taxman, providing an edge of class. Ultimately, Miss Fortunate focusses on a woman’s waves of pain, and builds to a powerful ritual of symbolic catharsis.”

— Ben Flanagan