Review of Polite Society (2023) by Hnestlyonthesly — 22 May 2023

Nida Manzoor’s Police Society is my current candidate for best film of the year, because it’s beautiful to look at, the fight scenes are fire, and the story is fresh and original. Without saying too much about the plot, because this is one I’m not interested in spoiling, so much as gifting to you, Ria is a young Pakistani girl in England with an overactive imagination–think Scott Pilgrim or The Mitchells vs the Machines but with kung fu, trying to swim her way culturally upstream to land her dream job as a stunt woman, while her older sister Lena has returned home after suffering some setbacks in art school. Lena starts dating a guy and shenanigans are afoot. Mazoor is the writer and director of this movie with few credits to her name before this. Her direction feels effervescent and thrilling like Boots Riley or Bo Burnham trying their hand at full creative control.

Lena, played by Ritu Arya who’s credits are long including notably her stint in the Umbrella Academy, is perfectly chameleon, at times morose and borderline manic, then bubbly and lovestruck. Her sister, played by the wonderful Priya Kansara, is a pure shot of sass, anxious and cocky all at once. Her dance sequence is funny and moves the plot along which is just awesome. I feel like I’ve been seeing a lot of chloroform in movies lately and I’m wondering if that’s going to be the unlikely theme of the year? Nimra Bucha, villain of the Ms Marvel series, which bears some wonderful sibling energy to this project, is having perfectly venomous. Ella Bruccoleri, who plays one of the local and spunky friends, is a bridge to another lovely and unbelievably funny anti-Marvel superhero comedy called Extraordinary, and her co-star Seraphina Beh won’t be far behind.

All three loyal readers of this blog know that I am a steadfast and loyal fan of long, choreographed fight scenes, especially when those fight scenes involve school-aged girls (see Sucker Punch and Assassination Nation, am I missing any?). The fights here are magical realist in nature and played for comedy, but they’re thrilling to watch. There are fight moves I cannot stop thinking about, even now a week after I sat down to see this movie next to Friend and Friend’s NEW FIANCE WHO CAME TO THE MOVIE WITH HER ENGAGEMENT RING ON AS A TEST AND I DIDN’T NOTICE. Someone actually told me later that they were surprised that I didn’t notice because I “seemed like the sort of person who would check,” as if that’s a type, but also as if that would be my specific type, and I’m here to say that under no circumstances am I going to notice what you’re wearing on your fingers with the exception that if you are wearing more than two rings I am going to be instantly anxious about spending a lot of time with you until I get what the underlying psychology is behind that.

Where was I? Polite Society. The movie finds ways to jump the shark in the third act, which I deem entirely appropriate. The soundtrack for this movie, pop songs sung in Arabic, fits again with the Adil el Arbi and Bilall Fallah (Ms Marvel) sonic aesthetic. There is so much going on with multi-racial, inter-generational immigrant stories without really having to have heart to hearts of any sort to drag the movie back to earth, which is impressive in its own right. I cannot speak more highly about the chaos energy of this story, the off-the-wall, gonzo nature of Manzoor’s dialogue or the kinetic, no-holds-barred action sequences. This movie is what Edgar Wright wishes he could do in his most vulnerable moments. This movie is what we’re going to be talking about in six months as a “sleeper hit,” which is actually just a hit.