Film review: The Solitary Alchemist

A still from The Solitary Alchemist

“Does suffering produce the best art? It’s not an original question, but it is one that prompts itself several times during the course of Brown’s portrait of the Trinidadian jeweller Barbara Jardine . . . The Solitary Alchemist is not so much concerned with what’s ultimately going to happen as it is with slowly and gently painting a picture of Jardine’s life and work.”

-- From my review of The Solitary Alchemist, in the current issue of the Caribbean Review of Books. An earlier version of the film won the jury prize for best T&T film at the ttff/09.