The Plague

Bluesky

Swimming is, by its nature, a solitary sport. Getting good at it requires long hours, week after week, moving through the water with no opportunity to talk or to focus on others. This is how most water polo players start out before abruptly switching to a sport in which teamwork is vital. There’s the occasional kid who takes to it like a duck to water, but for others, that sense of distance lingers. Is it possible to work effectively within the group whilst preserving separate ideals?

Ben (Everett Blunck) is a new arrival at the Tom Lerner Water Polo camp when this film begins. Due to complicated family circumstances, he gets there a little after the start of the season, so the other kids already know each other. Boys and girls are taught separately. He can only gaze at the latter from a distance, entranced by one girl in particular and willing to endure being teased about it. The boys have formed a tight hierarchical unit, led by the lazily charismatic Jake (Kayo Martin). Realising that he’ll be better off as part of it, Ben patiently puts up with Jake’s teasing about his lisp and, despite being uncomfortable about it, joins in with the bullying of another boy.

Eli (Kenny Rasmussen) doesn’t altogether seem to mind being an outsider. An awkward kid, perhaps autistic, he’s happy in his own company, behaving in ways which understandably seem odd to the others. These behaviours are almost certainly a contributary factor in the bullying, marking him out as a target, but the focus of it is a rash he has all over this body, the ‘plague’ of the title. It is this that Jake uses as a pretext for ostracising him, so that if he approaches, all the boys will cry out in alarm and run away. Only Ben seems to feel bad about this. Is it guilt, or is he just failing to live up to his idea of who he ought to be? That becomes more and more uncertain as the film progresses. He tries to befriend Eli but to keep their friendship strictly out of sight of the others. He doesn’t take the idea of the plague literally. Then something happens that knocks him right out of his comfort zone.

What might have been a pretty standard coming-of-age film is elevated by superb performances from the young actors, with both Blunck and Martin receiving major awards attention. Furthermore, there is a sinister tone to it which resonates beyond the cruelty of Jake’s pranks – which also, when it suits him, target Ben. The world these boys are preparing to enter is not the same one that older audience members grew up in. There is a sense of existential threat and social disintegration. Jake is a beneficiary of this breakdown and may be again. Still, beneath his relaxed demeanour there are deep insecurities. Ben seems to sense something of this, and there are moments when it seems that they might be able to help each other, if only they can think beyond the roles that they have fallen into.

Borrowing tropes from horror, the film adds an uncanny undercurrent to its drama and helps viewers of all ages to get into the mindset of its teenage characters, for whom the sense of threat is very real and immediate. A nocturnal assault by a gang reminds us of how physical altercations can be at that age and how easily they can get out of control, foreshadowing a much more serious incident towards the end. Most viewers will relate strongly to the link between disease, fear and isolation due to their experiences in 2020, whilst the recent rise in right wing rhetoric associating socially vulnerable groups with infection adds a further layer of discomfort. For all that it centres on teenagers, this is a film which, regardless of one’s age, can really get under one’s skin.

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