Picture this: you’re the friend or close acquaintance of a local poet who grew up in Atlanta and currently resides in Baltimore. One day, you receive an invite to his apartment for a three-pronged eve of activities. A film shoot, a dinner, and a journey back in time through the words of that very creator. When you arrive, you are one of very few, but you settle in as the man whose book you once read stands a mere few feet away, bearing his soul behind a kitchen counter. It’s unusual, raw, and altogether quite inspiring by night’s end. Director Richard Yeagley’s reflectionist film plays loosely with its documentary categorization; in fact, you could argue it’s in a league of its own, blending striking imagery and the writings of the man of the hour, one Mark Anthony Thomas.
In Need of Seawater is, above all else, an adventure. A life lived by Thomas and one he shares with those gathered around him. The short transports the viewer back to 2004, during a turbulent time when Thomas was coming to grips with his identity. From photographs and old videos to recreations of memories matched to the poems themselves, Yeagley has a plethora of engaging sequences to point to in this unique approach to the cinepoem meta. It’s like watching short films within short films, where each story is its own small chapter with assigned colors and sounds.
If we look at the short as a purely artistic vehicle, it’s a smashing success: the POV memory shots that evoke the visuals of Nickel Boys, the uplifting music, and those gorgeous crashing waves on the beach—it’s all beautifully composed even when a great deal of subtext is lost. At times the cutaways can be so engaging that jumping back to the “real world” almost eliminates the escapism on the spot. A climb that could have been gradual and consistent leapfrogs from Thomas’ realization of his budding adult life to a poem about the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement and Barack Obama. To call it disjointed would be a stretch, but the transitions in-between chapters don’t work all that well.
Individually, the poems and their storytelling are spectacular. Just like its genre ambiguity, In Need of Seawater leaves it to the viewer to interpret them as they are, without too much outside context. Whether you connect with what is being spoken is completely subjective, but it’s clear those close to Thomas do as well, and in turn, this encourages self-reflection on the viewer’s part as well. How would we look back at our past and the memories that shaped us? What images, words, scents, and ideas would we associate with them? The short inspires creativity.
A poetry night that’s part biographical documentary and part visual venture, In Need of Seawater is a largely satisfying look at the life and work of Mark Anthony Thomas.
