Peter Debruge Chief Film CriticMaybe she was kidding, but director Clio Barnard recently described “Ali & Ava” as her shot at making a “social-realist musical.” The phrase, which slipped out during an interview from the BFI London Film Festival, struck me as some kind of oxymoron at first: How could a rugged, true-to-life depiction of a struggling working-class English couple possibly coexist with that most surreal of cinematic genres?
But in light of the end result, Barnard’s ambition makes perfect sense. The film’s two title characters don’t burst into song out of the blue but rather, listen to music as an escape from their everyday stresses.
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