Andrew Legge: Science fiction drama “Lola”: Dangerous visions

“You can only understand life backwards, but you have to live it forwards,” the philosopher Søren Kierkegaard once said. This rule doesn’t apply in the film. Many filmmakers have long been resorting to time travel and breaking down time levels. Director Andrew Legge’s feature film debut “Lola” also dares to try the thought experiment. In the science fiction drama, two sisters (Thom and Mars) invent a device (Lola) that receives radio and television broadcasts from the future; they themselves do not leave their time plane. But their knowledge is power. And so it is inevitable that they also intervene in the course of history.

In »Lola«, Legge wildly mixes up time and reality levels and combines fictional film material from the past with real archive material. In the film, the material presents visions of events that have not yet occurred. The retro-futuristic, sometimes dark soundtrack was composed by “The Divine Comedy” frontman Neil Hannon. Some pieces have hit potential, and that’s a good thing, because Hannon’s sound runs like a common thread through the sometimes very flickering (archive) material. Thanks to this trick and convincing leading actresses, Legge has managed to create an exciting trip into a time that re-writes our history.

Here Legge expands on an idea from his short film “The Chronoscope”. The mockumentary told about a machine that used radio waves to produce images from the past; Lola now shows realities from the future. The story focuses on Thomasina “Thom” Hanbury (Emma Appleton) and Martha “Mars” Hanbury (Stefanie Martini), who invent the miracle device Lola – named after their mother – after the early death of their parents. At the end of the 1930s, they received radio and television broadcasts from the future using electromagnetic pulses. They lead a carefree, somewhat crazy life between the present and the future. Ahead of their time, they listen to “Major Tom,” David Bowie (“Space Oddity”) and the Kinks (“You really got me”), watch films and witness social events that haven’t actually happened yet. They use their knowledge to place surefire bets in horse betting. Mars uses the winnings to buy a car and Thom a horse that she likes to ride around the house on.

In general, Mars is the more emotional of the two and so it is Thom who first realizes that Lola can be not only a cultural toy, but also a weapon. As the Second World War comes to a head in London in 1941, she feels it is her duty to intervene in her country’s war and warn the British army of an impending Nazi attack. She is soon celebrated as the unknown “Angel of Portobello”. Since Thom and Mars receive the radio waves for Lola via gas pipes, they remain undetected for a long time until one day the military shows up at the door. Thom continues to control the fate of the world while her sister falls in love with a young officer (Rory Fleck Byrne). The two sisters will become increasingly distant from each other and unforeseen, fatal events will happen. The fact that David Bowie will never be born and instead the fascist sound of Reginald Watson and the dark “Sound of Marching Feet” will be heard is only the first step.

Andrew Legge tells the story from the perspective of Mars’ camera looking back. »Lola« is a personal hobby project through and through. This can also be seen in the way Legge combines found footage material with newly recorded scenes. First he collected historical material from Pathé, Getty, AP and Alamy, then camerawoman Oona Menges shot the scenes with the two sisters. In order for the film to appear as authentic as possible, historical cameras were used. Menges borrowed the same Arriflex 35mm camera that Stanley Kubrick had used to film a scene from “A Clockwork Orange.” The camera itself comes from the 50s.

Legge also captured short scenes on 16mm film with his private, wind-up Bolex camera from the 1930s. He developed the images in his bathtub, dried the film and then had it scanned. Since Mars always accompanies her sister with the camera in the film, actress Stefanie Martini (Mars) filmed some key scenes herself with the Bolex. Fictional newsreels and other historical recordings, which were placed in a new context, supplement the montage material. For example, the team selected a snippet of Adolf Hitler from thousands of recordings. In the original the guide looks at a VW Beetle, in the film he looks at Lola through clever cuts. Such astonishing interweavings of reality and fiction give the science fiction film a deeper context and that’s why you can easily forgive the occasional poor quality shot. »Lola« encourages you to think about the past, present and future and that is the real journey through time.

“Lola”; IRL, UK 2022. Directed by Andrew Legge, written by Andrew Legge, Angeli Macfarlane. Starring: Stefanie Martini, Emma Appleton, Rory Fleck Byrne, Aaron Monaghan. 80 minutes, theatrical release: December 28th.