'Before The Moon Falls' Review: A Devastating & Educational Documentary On Sia Figiel

Before the Moon Falls is one of the most educational and devastating movies I have watched in a while. Written, directed, and produced by Kimberlee Bassford, the documentary starts off as a very by-the-numbers look into the life of acclaimed Samoan writer, Sia Figiel. You learn about her childhood, her family, her love interest, and the trials and tribulations she had to face while authoring books like Where We Once Belonged, They Who Do Not Grieve, and Freelove. Then it delves into Sia’s physical complications as well as mental health problems. And as soon as you are wondering where the narrative is gonna go, you get the shocking revelation that Sia has been accused of murder. It’s not just shocking for us, the viewers, but also Bassford, because there’s no way that she could have anticipated that. From that point onwards, the documentary transforms into a completely different beast, as Bassford struggles to paint an empathetic portrait of her protagonist while also informing her audience about the dangers of bipolar disorder. The conclusion that the movie arrives at might be uncomfortable, but that’s probably the biggest reason why it’s a must watch.

To start things off, I am gonna acknowledge my ignorance of Sia before I watched Before the Moon Falls. At the same time, I think that’s why the movie affected me so much. If I went into it knowing about the revelation at the half-way mark, I wouldn’t have been as moved as I was when the information hit me without any warning. I mean, I would have been emotionally affected, but it’s possible that the anticipation of that revelation would have overshadowed the impact of the heartbreaking trajectory of Sia’s life story. And if that was the reaction I had to Sia committing murder, I can’t even begin to imagine what it might have been like for Bassford. We get to see her sort of processing the information and trying to mold the narrative around this “twist.” However, that’s probably the sanitized version of the confusion and anxiety she must’ve experienced. I know that this is probably not the point of the movie but, if you look at it from a filmmaker’s perspective, it is a triumph. We have heard about so many films and TV shows suffering from various kinds of logistical problems; there are making-of documentaries about films that were a rollercoaster ride to execute. However, I feel that all of them pale in comparison to this project, simply because of the unexpected changes that the subject matter of the film underwent.

Continuing on the topic of the filmmaking in Before the Moon Falls, the decision to visualize excerpts from Sia’s writings as animated sequences is genius. I am a sucker for movies that change the medium occasionally to shift the vibe of the storytelling. It kinda takes us from the world of hyper-realism to the realm of fantasy without sacrificing the emotional core of the narrative. In addition to that, the animated sequences give us a peek into how Bassford views Sia’s words, which in turn tells us the kind of images that Sia’s words are capable of conjuring. And I really appreciate the fact that the animation is hand-drawn or digital. As in, there’s no involvement of generative AI. I have to bring up that abomination because I don’t know why it even exists. The reason why I like to consume art is because it is the artist’s interpretation of the world around them. The tool they use can be a paintbrush or a computer, but the artist’s soul needs to be in the bridge between said artist and their medium. If you are telling a program to interpret your observations, that soul goes missing, and that breaks your art; heck, in my opinion, it stops being art. I know that this is a wild tangent, but yeah, the animated sequences were marvelous to look at and I had to give Bassford and her crew kudos for that (while also reminding myself that I need to watch Tower and Flee).

The mental health aspect of Before the Moon Falls is the hardest aspect of the documentary to comment upon. I don’t think there’s anything I can say that Bassford hasn’t already said, and that too in a really sensitive manner. There are so many stereotypes about bipolar disorder that it’s tough to dispel everything with one movie. I don’t know if this movie is gonna succeed or fail in that endeavor. What I do know, or maybe hope, that this movie is gonna do is inform people how much more we need to learn about mental health. We always tend to treat it as a monolith, and as soon as people don’t fall into the parameters set by said monolith, we cast them aside and let them rot. We have learnt that mental health, much like everything else in the world, is a spectrum, and we can’t take the “one size fits all” approach to treating patients. Treatment needs to be tailor-made to the individual’s problems and every time a method doesn’t work out, we have to recalibrate and think of a different angle to help them out. Now, what the movie lowkey shows us is that there’s a good chance that even that customized plan may not always work, and all we can do is accept that reality. That doesn’t mean that we are giving up on the patient; it just means that we have to prepare ourselves, and the individual with mental health problems, for the worst and hope for the best.

I have a habit of wishlisting any and every book that I see in a movie or a show in the hopes that I am gonna read it once I retire. This was the first time that I went into an existential crisis after wishlisting Sia’s books ,because I kept going back and forth about whether or not I’m endorsing the work of a criminal by reading them or just doing my part to understand mental health better. If I am doing the latter, is that because I have been emotionally manipulated by the film into doing so? And would I show this level of grace to someone whose life story hasn’t been fleshed out before me via a movie? I don’t really know, and I think that’s great. Life isn’t all black and white, and whenever we face some kind of complexity, we tend to run away from it. So, I suppose that it’s a good thing Bassford is compelling us to work our way through the feelings that this movie and Sia are evoking within us. I definitely think that everyone should give Before the Moon Falls a watch. I will warn you that the subject matter can be very triggering. If you are struggling with mental health issues, make sure that you are properly equipped to handle the subject matter. In addition to that, I hope that Bassford’s documentary inspires other filmmakers to treat mental health in a sensitive manner and avoid resorting to stereotypes just to make the plot “juicy.”