FILM
On a Mission for Her Sibling
Queer former boxer embarks on quest to save her sister in “Catch the Fair One”
BY STEVE ERICKSON
“Catch the Fair One” could
have gone seriously awry.
Picture an action movie
starring Liam Neeson or
Bruce Willis as the friend of a Native
American woman whose sister
has been kidnapped by sex traffi
ckers. Amidst many lurid images
of half-naked women, the strong,
silent heroes torture and murder
dozens of people involved in the
sex trade. The sister is depicted as
a helpless victim in need of rescue
by our action hero. Following a
massive bloodbath, she’s returned
to her sibling.
Although “Catch the Fair One”
director Josef Kubota Wladyka is
a white man, he wrote the story
— which doesn’t actually involve
Neeson or Willis — in collaboration
with the fi lm’s lead actor, Kali
Reis. Reis is a queer woman of Native
American and Cape Verdean
descent. She’s also a professional
boxer. Her real-life background
plays a key role in her character.
She plays a strong, silent type, as
well, but her body is on the line,
without the macho masochism of
so many Stallone and Gibson vehicles.
She sleeps with a razor blade
in her mouth, and in one scene of
“Catch the Fair One” she turns out
to need that razor.
Kaylee (Reis) is a former boxer
now working as a waitress. “Catch
the Fair One” bookends the main
story with fantasy scenes of her
preparing for a fi ght. Her younger
sister Yeeta (Mainaku Borrero) disappeared
on her way home from the
gym. She now lives in a homeless
shelter. A scene where she meets
her mother (Kimberly Guerrero)
fi lls in some details — we learn that
she’s in recovery from drug problems
and broke up with her former
girlfriend two years ago. Not satisfi
ed with the all-indigenous support
group she attends, she hatches a
plan to get revenge on the man who
kidnapped her sister.
“Catch the Fair One” makes
purposeful use of its style, even the
elements, which are quite familiar.
The cinematography is extremely
Kali ‘KO’ Reis as “Kaylee” in “Catch the Fair One.”
dark. That’s par for the course in
genre fi lms and TV these days. But
Wladyka didn’t just turn off the
lights. He communicates Kaylee’s
despair by having a single beam
of light illuminate the dark frame.
“Catch the Fair One” was shot during
winter, which infl uenced its
look. However, it also uses color
purposefully. If the story has overtones
of fi lm noir, “fi lm bleu” would
be a better term for it. A metallic
blue-gray look saturates its costumes
and sets.
The subject matter has salacious
potential, as the scene where
Kaylee “auditions” for a traffi cker
requires her to expose her body as
he masturbates. While she has to
strip down to her bra and panties,
the fi lm’s dark lighting helps
it avoid a leering gaze. She never
takes off all her clothes, but the
man who becomes her primary
target does. The audience gets to
watch him shower in the nude.
Indigenous people are often forgotten
about in American life. (As
a scholar says in the folk-horror
documentary “Woodlands Dark
IFC FILMS
and Days Bewitched,” all of America
is an “Indian burial ground.”)
When movies and TV depict them
in the present day (the recent show
“Reservation Dogs” being a major
exception), they’re seen as nobly
pathetic victims eking out a life
amidst poverty and alcoholism.
“Catch the Fair One” acknowledges
these problems, but it takes the
male anti-hero archetype, fl ips the
gender, and plays with our ideas
about who gets to commit violence
and why.
Kaylee eventually goes full Jack
Bauer, stabbing a man, twisting
the knife to make it more agonizing,
and waterboarding him. The
choice of that torture technique
seems purposeful. If one act could
sum up the imperialism and warmongering
America turned to as a
response to 9/11, that would be it.
Here, Kaylee takes out her anger
on the right target, but everyone
thinks their targets are worthy.
The fi lm’s violence is brutal, never
played for cheap thrills. In the end,
Kaylee and her family have been
failed by American institutions.
She learns that her sister was kidnapped
to cater to men with a fetish
for underage indigenous girls.
The police have done nothing to
stop this trade.
So many vigilante fi lms are
about white men whose entitlement
leads them to the conclusion
that they’re justifi ed to use violence.
“Catch the Fair One” doesn’t
offer violence as a solution to the
real-life problem of sexual abuse of
indigenous girls and women, but it
doesn’t have any better answers.
After the fi rst half hour, Kaylee
becomes a hardened warrior, at
the cost of distance from her community.
The grim vibe cuts hard,
reminding us that one woman’s individual
actions can only go so far
in rectifying systemic violence.
CATCH THE FAIR ONE | Directed
by Josef Kubota Wladyka |
IFC Films | Opens at the IFC Center
Feb. 11th
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