Senior staff writer Helen Chen reviews a movie from the Athena Film Festival.

As a housekeeper, no one pays attention to her. The owners of the households talk and argue while she’s in the background. These scenes haunt We Strangers, one of the movies that aired at the Athena Film Festival, written and directed by Anu Valia. This film is Valia’s directorial debut and has already garnered acclaim at various film festivals. Valia was the winner of the New American Cinema Competition at the Seattle Film Festival and the Grand Jury Prize at the Dallas International Film Festival. 

Starring Kirby Howell-Baptiste as Ray, the film follows Ray, who is a housekeeper hired by Neeraj, played by Hari Dhillon, to clean his home as well as Neeraj’s neighbor, Jean, played by Maria Dizzia. As the film progresses, Ray, a working-class woman, finds leverage over her employers and navigates the dynamics of Jean’s circles.

As Ray is cleaning the floor, Jean openly muses about how wonderful it would be if she was able to have special knowledge of the world akin to having the abilities of a psychic, and Ray promises to give Jean that special insight. Ray’s shifting eyes and pause suggest that she might’ve made that up. It is not entirely clear if the colors that flash on the screen are Ray’s vision, if she had been making those details up by observing Jean’s home, or if that is Jean’s projection. In any case, Jean buys it. The power play between Ray and Jean is reminiscent of Parasite. As Ray takes advantage of the oblivion, perhaps desperation, of Jean to better her own financial situation, Jean does not let her money go to waste. When Ray first enters her home, Jean is initially hesitant, ushering her away, but in learning that Neeraj has paid for her cleaning service already, starts ordering Ray around. She grows incredibly comfortable commanding Ray and feels entitled to her service. Jean parades Ray’s psychic abilities to her friends, shaping people’s perception of Ray before Ray even enters the conversation. 

When Ray is not a housekeeper, she is either taking care of her two kids or seeing her mother, played by Tina Clifford. Ray’s wife, Mari, is played by Kara Young. The home is not just an impersonal mess to clean, but a reprieve as well. I was interested in the interpersonal tensions that sketched out the contours of class, gender, and race. Notably, almost all of the scenes in the movie occur in someone’s home, whether Ray is on or off work. We Strangers balances the claustrophobic horror of the house with its possibility for intimacy. 

The film was an intriguing experience as the eerie feeling of the film’s narrative parts came together in one quiet piece.

Image via Picryl