How Do You Talk About a Movie Like Josephine?

""Brains are pretty delicate things." Someone says this early on in Josephine, and Beth de Araújo's film expands on it by entering the mind of an eight-year-old girl who has witnessed a horrific crime. During an early morning soccer practice with her father in Golden Gate Park, Josephine (Mason Reeves) sees a stranger rape a jogger by some public bathrooms. The story is topical, to be sure, and it could easily make for cheap sentiment,"

"That requires fairly bold stylization, but the film never feels overtly aestheticized, because the formal approach fits the character's psychology. As played by the rather wonderful Reeves, Jo is a hesitant, impressionable child. Her father, Damien (Channing Tatum), is big on physical fitness and powering through things: "Scared don't live here," he tells her after trying to get her to run under a closing garage door, part of their morning workout."

"Jo begins to see the perpetrator everywhere in her life - hanging out quietly, sitting at the family dinner table, playing with her pet mouse, coloring her books. It's a disturbing conceit that could easily become a heavy-handed one, but de Araújo handles it with surprisingly grim elegance, filming in long takes that float around rooms and occasionally pass by this ghostly figure out of Jo's trauma,"

Josephine, an eight-year-old, witnesses a stranger rape a jogger during a morning soccer practice with her father in Golden Gate Park. Her father, Damien, emphasizes physical fitness and tells her "Scared don't live here," while Jo remains hesitant and fearful. After the rapist is apprehended—partly because Damien chases him with the police—Jo begins experiencing intrusive visions of the perpetrator appearing in domestic scenes and everyday objects. The portrayal uses stylized long takes that float through rooms, allowing the ghostly figure to appear subtly and aligning cinematic form with Jo's fragile psychology. Jo becomes the only person who can identify the man in court, prompting scrutiny over her competence to testify while coping with trauma. Mason Reeves portrays Jo's vulnerability; Channing Tatum plays her father; Philip Ettinger plays the accused.

Read at Vulture