Juniper

Juniper (2021) is a New Zealand drama with a comic edge that you can watch online on iFILM. It marks the feature debut of writer-director Matthew J. Saville. The setup is simple: a troubled teenager, suspended from school, gets handed the job of looking after his grandmother.

That grandmother, Ruth, is a retired war photographer who drinks gin by the tumbler and refuses to be coddled from her wheelchair. Charlotte Rampling plays her, and she owns every scene — sharp-tongued, stubborn, fully alive. Sam (George Ferrier) starts out pouring her drinks under protest. He ends up changed. His father, played by Marton Csokas, can barely talk to either of them.

Ninety-four minutes, no big plot twists, and that restraint is the point. It's a film about going out on your own terms, and about two hard-headed people who meet somewhere over a glass and a cigarette. Quiet cinema for anyone tired of loud, weepy dramas. Stream Juniper (2021) online on iFILM.