Amma Asante’s debut feature Belle (2013) was a universally well received period drama which told the extraordinary real life story of Dido Elizabeth Belle, the daughter of Royal Navy officer Sir John Lindsay and of an African slave. In her latest historical drama Where Hands Touch, Asante presents a well-intentioned, if tonally flawed story about a biracial German teenager (Amandla Stenberg) who falls madly in love with a member of the Hitler Youth (George MacKay).
The year is 1944 and 15-year old Leyna (Stenberg), daughter of a white German mother (Abbie Cornish) and a black French soldier, lives in fear after moving from the countryside to Berlin where her mother believes she’ll be safer. When she meets Lutz (MacKay), the son of a prominent SS officer (Christopher Eccleston) and a member of the Hitler Youth, the two fall madly in love, putting both their lives at risk.
Determined to believe that she will never encounter the fate suffered by her Jewish neighbours who have all either been murdered or sent to camps, Leyna remains adamant that she loves “the fatherland” just as much as the next German. The young woman’s world soon comes crashing down when she is deemed undeserving of her German nationality, triggering a series of events leading her to realise the horrors being committed by Hitler’s army.
Asante offers a historically accurate, if ill-judged narrative which appears to be far more concerned with a fairly mundane love story than in the bigger picture. Where Hands Touch is ultimately let down by a deeply contrived storyline and tone-deaf melodramatic style which only serves to diminish the importance and urgency of the real life stories behind Assante’s screenplay.
Furthermore, and even if one is willing to ignore its lack of subtlety, and decidedly TV movie-like quality, Where Hands Touch falls short of convincing, mainly due to its inability to capitalise on what could have been such an enriching premise.
Amandla Stenberg, last seen in the brilliant “Black Lives Matter” vehicle The Hate U Give (2018), gives a formidable performance which is seldom hampered by the film’s feeble screenplay. For his part, George MacKay (soon to be starring in the upcoming The True History of the Kelly Gang) puts in a solid turn as Lutz, despite the obvious shortcomings of a badly written character.
Overall Where Hands Touch is hugely lacking in believability and subtlety. Assante offers a cliché-laden storyline that never quite manages to ring true, which is a real shame as there was definitely an interesting story to tell here. Sadly, it just isn’t this one.
