Final Rating: 4/5
Topology of Sirens is an experimental film about experimental music. It is a cross between slow burning transcendental cinema and a detective story. It’s a film that likely will test some viewers’ patience and what they consider the be sonically pleasing music, but for those willing to meditate on music and mystery it will be a rewarding watch filled with possibilities.
The film follows Cas, played by Courtney Stephens, as she is moving into her now deceased aunt’s old house. We don’t know a lot about Cas. She studied classical piano and possibly now teaches music and is friends with people in the experimental music community, one that intrigues her but she isn’t necessarily wanting to participate in. While moving into the new house, she discovers her bedroom closet is locked, so she picks it open. Inside is only a hurdy-gurdy, an instrument with an ominous name (thanks in part to the Donovon song “Hurdy Gurdy Man” that features predominantly in David Fincher’s Zodiac). Cas’ dad claims that he cleaned out the whole house and there was nothing there, and isn’t even sure if the instrument that has its origins in the 11th Century was even Cas’ aunts. This is the first mystery of the film. From there things slowly become more complicated. The hurdy-gurdy seems to not be in a working condition, but on the back side of it there is a small compartment that is housing a handful of mini-cassettes that are used in answering machines. These tapes feature weird symbols on them with no words. Cas visits an audio equipment store (with the proprietor played by the films director Jonathan Davies) where she is able to get a device to listen to the tapes. Listening to them reveals almost as much information as the cryptic symbols written on them provide. The tapes consist of either drone music consisting of sustained atonal notes, or are field recordings of things like baseball games or a small bell being chimed. The only clue on any of the tapes is a jingle that was recorded advertising a local television station. From there Cas slowly gets bread crumbs for clues that lead her to a hurdy-gurdy dealer, an antique estate sale, a baseball diamond and more.
The film’s title contains two interesting clues when trying to decode the movie. The first being “Topology”, which in mathematics, is concerned with the properties of a geometric object that are preserved under continuous deformations, such as stretching, twisting, crumpling, and bending. This is the mystery of life, you can bend or stretch your perceptions of people and events but it doesn’t actually change things, only how you process them. The second key word is “Sirens” which, in Greek mythology, were dangerous creatures who lured nearby sailors with their enchanting music and singing voices to shipwreck on the rocky coast of their island. Cas is being lured by the dissonant tones of the tapes and what they mean. They lure her into a mystery that she is utterly compelled to find out what it all means.
Trying to learn about the making of the film is also a bit like the mystery that Cas embarks. Courtney Stephens, the lead, is mostly a writer and director whose last acting credit was almost a decade ago. Director Johnathan Davies is making his directorial debut, but looking at his filmography he has almost exclusively worked as a Music Supervisor or Coordinator on films such as The Bronze and The Choice and on the TV show Fargo. It makes sense given his background that he would make a movie about music. In the end credits, dialogue is credited to the cast, meaning that the script was likely almost completely improvised with Davies being credited as the writer and Brendan Mattox with additional dialogue.
As the film moves along, we do get to understand more where the Sirens aspect comes from as first we see a painting at the estate sale, where Cas remarks that you can’t tell if one of the two sirens in the painting is going in to hug the other or push her off the cliff. Later on when she travels to an island to follow a new lead we get a shot of water with lots of ripples, that eventually transforms from Cas to two new women. We see a brief journey of these two women, at first unsure what they are doing, but eventually turns out that it is essentially a flashback of sorts setting up Cas’ journey of discovery. The film dabbles in bits of magical realism that are so subtle viewers shouldn’t be faulted for missing it completely.
The camera is always subtly moving in almost every shot. We get long unbroken takes of beautiful landscapes as Cas slowly walks through the frame, contemplating information she has just received and what else she needs to unravel the mystery. The film poses plenty of questions like Under the Silver Lake, but instead of providing answers it allows the viewer to peacefully meditate on what it all means. It features a very quiet and restrained performance from Stephens, but one that works within the world that Davies has created. The music is integral to the movie and it drifts between off putting and relaxing and finding the beauty in everyday sounds to backdrop it all.
Topology of Sirens was seen during the 2022 Fantasia Festival. Thank you to the festival for the screener.
