Colin Firth and Stanley Tucci Shine in Moving Drama Supernova

By Linda Barnard

Rating: A-

The conversation that opens Supernova is familiar to any road-tripping couple.

“We’re not going back,” Sam (Colin Firth) tells husband Tusker (Stanley Tucci) as they begin the drive to England’s Lake District in their ancient camper van.

Did I leave wet clothes in the dryer? Have you seen my glasses?

There’s deeper meaning here. Novelist Tusker’s forgetfulness comes from his rapidly progressing early-onset dementia.

His longtime spouse Sam, a pianist who has stepped back from performing, scolds Tusker but he would love to go back in time. He’s also desperate to be able to look ahead to a future with both of them still together as they always were. Neither is possible.

Writer/director Harry Macqueen (Hinterland) does best with this deeply moving drama of devotion and the dread of approaching loss when he stands back and lets these two actors loose. Firth and Tucci provide arguably the best performances of their careers as two 60-something lovers facing a crisis.

Two straight actors playing a same-sex couple may be disappointing casting. But give Firth and Tucci a chance. They convey emotional and physical intimacy with caring authenticity. This genuinely feels like long-time love and it’s a profound thing to watch.

They occasionally bicker and tease each other. Tusker is best at that and at first, it seems that his struggles with a road map and Sam’s uptight fretting are personality quirks. They signal deeper things.

PROUDLY SUPPORTS ORIGINAL-CIN

There are moments of tenderness. There is also grief as stoic Sam tries to sort out his feelings about what is happening to Tusker, who has been keeping a devastating secret.

“I need to be remembered for who I was and not for who I’m about to become,” Tusker tells Sam.

Their long-delayed road trip takes them to the house where Sam grew up and where his sister (Bodyguard’s Pippa Haywood) and her family now live. There will be long walks and good food, wine and conversation by the fire. Sam is preparing to play his first concert after a lengthy break. Tusker will work on his new novel. They’ll do some stargazing, a passion of Tusker’s.

But first, an overnight stop at a quiet lake where they camped in the early days of what would become a long and loving relationship.

Dementia as the wolf at the door for a couple has been handled more deftly in screenplays with films Still Alice (Wash Westmoreland and Richard Glatzer) and Sarah Polley’s Away From Her. A stargazing exchange to hammer home the film title origins is a bit of a clunker.

But a following scene at a celebratory table as a faltering Tusker asks Sam to read a speech that includes his feelings for his partner is powerful and poignant. If we were allowed to sit in a movie theatre these days, that’s the moment you’d hear people around you sniffing back tears.

With frame-filling cinematography by Dick Pope (Mr. Turner), the autumn hills of northwest England seem to glow, the narrow and curving roads leading to an unknowable destination. An elegant score by Keaton Henson is quietly mournful.

And here’s a surprise: there’s no piano double for Firth, who plays Edward Elgar’s haunting and romantic “Salut d’Amour” as a heartbreaking finale.

Supernova. Written and directed by Harry Macqueen. Starring Colin Firth and Stanley Tucci. Streaming beginning February 16 on Apple TV and VOD platforms. Also available to rent on digital TIFF Bell Lightbox starting February 19.