Second Coming makes for an atmospheric if challenging cinematic debut for writer/director debbie tucker green with another cracking lead role for Nadine Marshall
“Have you had any more visions?”
Following her TV adaptation of her own play random, Second Coming sees writer-director debbie tucker green making her big screen debut. And perhaps unsurprisingly, it is an uncompromising artistic statement – again showcasing Black British lives – from this idiosyncratic and intriguing artist.
The film centres on Nadine Marshall’s Jackie, a social worker and mother-of-one who finds herself pregnant despite having been told she couldn’t carry again. Not only that, she hasn’t had intercourse with her husband Mark for quite some time, despite him being Idris Elba. So far so immaculate.
But there are no easy answers here, few answers at all in fact. tucker green implements a hazy fugue state throughout, dialogue often vague as the fractured narrative progresses, extended takes pulling the focus in unexpected direction, expressionistic explosions raining from the sky.
Marshall does a magnificent job with a rather enigmatic lead character, so little explained but so much felt as her life teeters out of control and Kai Francis Lewis is brilliant as her son JJ, worried about the impact of a new sibling. Cinematographer Ula Pontikos creates gorgeous tableaux and not only that, there’s bonus Nicola Walker near the end. A film worth tracking down.
