CODA is writer/director Sian Heder’s charming coming of age comedy/drama about the daughter of a family of scrappy, independent fishermen, who all happen to be deaf except her. CODA means “child of deaf adults” but it also has a musical meaning, making it the perfect title for a film about a teen with a passion for singing, something her family neither hears nor comprehends.
With deaf actors in the roles of the girl’s brother and parents, including Oscar-winner Marlee Matlin as her feisty mother, and wonderful performances all around, writer/director Sian Heder’s often-funny, warm tale of a family, different from the ordinary and yet not, is sure to bring smiles and delight audiences.
CODA has been praised by deaf communities both for casting deaf actors in the roles and for its realistic depiction of a deaf family. The film won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, along with other awards, and is a true crowd-pleaser that also impresses with its authenticity. Shot on location in Gloucester, Massachusetts, it is an American remake of the 2014 French film LA FAMILLE BÉLIER with a strong, and surprisingly international, cast.
CODA certainly does feel authentic, but the film’s appeal goes beyond that, with its focus on believable family dynamics and distinctive personalities, where the parents’ deafness is just a part of the picture. CODA is, at its heart, a coming-of-age story more than anything, with a delightful performance by English actress Emilia Jones as a girl who loves her quirky family but has ambitions that are just different from family tradition.
Ruby Rossi (Emilia Jones) is a 17-year-old living in the coastal Massachusetts town of Gloucester, where she is the only hearing member of her fishing family. Every morning before school, Ruby joins her father Frank (Troy Kotsur) and older brother Leo (Daniel Durant) on their fishing boat. Having Ruby on the boat allows them to monitor the radio for alerts and communicate with hearing fisherman and those who buy the catch on the dock when they return. At home, her mother (Marlee Matlin) does the bookkeeping for the family business. At school, Ruby faces some bullying but having best friend Gertie (Canadian actress Amy Forsyth) to count on helps.
As the film works through the family dynamics, it also explores Ruby’s budding interest in singing when she impulsively signs up for choir. The choir teacher Bernardo Villalobos (Mexican actor/comedian Eugenio Derbez), also know as Mr. V, is a quirky character but despite Ruby’s shyness, he recognizes her talent. Mr. V suggests she apply to a music college in Boston, even offering to coach her for the audition. Suiting the interests of his students in this fishing village, he picks a classic pop ballad to prepare for Ruby’s audition. For the upcoming school concert, the teacher also pairs her with Miles (Irish actor/musician Ferdia Walsh-Peelo), a boy Ruby is interested in.
Ultimately, a crisis in the family business arises and Ruby is faced with a choice between her own ambitions and her family.
Writer/director Sian Heder hails from Massachusetts, although not from Gloucester, so she understands the strong family fishing tradition in this part of New England. The Rossi family has done this for generations, as dad Frank tells us, and they are counting on Ruby to help continue the family business, and even more so as the only hearing one in the family. That the rest of her family can’t hear the singing Ruby loves doing, just makes it all the more difficult for them to understand her passion.
In many ways, it is just like any family business, where a child develops an interest far outside its expectations and traditions. But Ruby’s ability to hear is a particularly useful skill for her deaf family, enabling them to keep more of their aloofness from the hearing community around them than they might otherwise. Her parents’ dependence on Ruby to do these things puts pressure on her and frustrates their son Leo, who reads lips, and wants to do more to help them deal with the hearing community the surrounds them.
While some elements of the story are familiar, the script handles them very well. But the real appeal of the film is its characters and the performances. All the actors are terrific, especially Emilia Jones as Ruby, who is a complete charmer, and completely believable, beaming with energy and high spirits, and bouncing back from set-backs with determination, despite her shyness and normal teen self-doubts. She is perfect in the ensemble scenes with the family, and both cute and self-possessed in the ones with love-interest Ferdia Walsh-Peelo as Miles.
The scenes with the family are delightful, as they joke and tease. The use of sign language and Ruby’s combination of signing and speaking is handled so well that we never are confused about what is going on, and the snappy banter and warm quirky family scenes move smoothly at a brisk but clear pace.
By casting deaf actors, the film goes a long way towards getting things right from the start. As her parents, Marlee Matlin and Troy Kotsur are perfectly cast as a couple, and completely delightful, funny and loving and with a nice together-we-can -do-anything feeling. As Ruby’s older brother, Daniel Durant is excellent as well, presenting his struggle to assert himself as an asset to the family and his own independence, while engaging in playful sibling teasing with his sister.
Some of the funniest, most appealing scenes are with this lively family. Humor dominates the family scenes, along with a sassy, thumbing-their-noses-at-the-world independence. The family scenes are the film’s highlights, and the ensemble acting is wonderful. Marlee Matlin, unsurprisingly, shines as the still-sexy mom and Troy is appealing as Ruby’s rebellious but loving dad. The sibling squabbling between Ruby and Leo is spot on as well.
Unlike some deaf families, the Rossis do not live in a community of deaf people but of hearing ones, and see their deaf friends infrequently. The family lives apart from the rest of the community, in an appealing kind of close-knit, defiant independence. Dad comes from a long line of New England fishermen, mom was a model in her youth, and despite years of marriage, they can’t keep their hands off each other. Although their older child Leo, played well by Daniel Durant, is also deaf, he reads lips and feels much more comfortable interacting with the hearing community than his parents do. He would like to have a more active role in helping them but they continually turn to their hearing daughter for that role, much to Leo’s frustration.
As the film works through the family dynamics, it also explores Ruby’s growing ambitions and passion for singing, and her budding romantic interest in Miles.
Ruby’s quirky music teacher Mr. V, provides a big dose of humor. Mr. V is a bit of a character as well as an immigrant, in a town that seems to have few of them, and Eugenio Derbez creates one of the film’s funniest, most memorable characters who as much as outsider as Ruby feels she is in her small town. His outsider status and his skill as a teacher help her see beyond the fishing boat and her life with her loving but inward-looking family.
There are a lot of parallels to the immigrant experience to Ruby’s “outsider” family in CODA. One can see echos of stories of second-generation children, who have a foot in both worlds, the “new” and the “old” with Ruby, among them that she says that when she started school, kids teased her for her “deaf accent,” referring to the distinctive speech style of deaf people who are taught to speak, a nice detail which reveals that her loving parents did their best for their hearing daughter by speaking to her.
Subtle insights like that are woven smoothly into Heder’s well-written script. Heder’s script is well-crafted, effective, warm and entertaining, the direction is seamless and skillful, and the characters are memorable, particularly Ruby and her charmingly quirky family.
CODA’s characters are so appealing in their feisty quirkiness and family warmth, that it is the kind of film you will want to revisit. The story is both universal and unique to these characters, and that is a combination that is hard to beat.
CODA, the winner of the 2022 Oscars for Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay and with Troy Kotsur winning for Best Supporting Actor, re-opens Friday, April 1, at Landmark’s Plaza Frontenac Cinema and is streaming on Apple TV+.
RATING: 4 out of 4 stars
