A gay Irishman navigates the dangers and disappearances of AIDS-era London in David Turpin's bruise-tender debut feature.
By Guy Lodge
Plus IconGuy Lodge
Film Critic
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Leanne Sullivan It’s at the tail of its closing credit scroll that “Ancestors” drops its final, plainly worded message, also setting its title in context: “No survivors, only descendants.” As the sign-off for this heartbroken drama of connections made and lost as AIDS ravaged London’s queer community in the late 1980s, it’s a lyrical rejoinder to anyone who attaches some manner of virtue to having lived through the crisis; a reminder, too, that the spirit of those who died too soon is still carried by those born into a safer, more permissive era. This auspicious first feature by Irish writer-director David Turpin is often poetically complex in sentiment but rawly direct in feeling; it overreaches here and there, only to pull back and punch you right in the gut.
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