[1] Adapted from Martha Baillie's novel The Incident Report,[2] the film stars Britt Lower as Miriam, a librarian in Toronto who leads a closed-off, grief-stricken life after her father's death; amid a series of strange incidents at the library, she meets and begins a romance with Janko (Tom Mercier), a Slovenian immigrant who opens her up to new possibilities.
[3] The cast also includes Sook-Yin Lee, Jean Yoon, Jaimara Beals, Clyde Whitham, Susannah Hoffmann, Scott McCulloch, Igor Shamuilov, Joshua Odjick, Sarah Li Wen Du, Anita Yung, Peter Millard, Danté Prince, Scott Ryan Yamamura, Jamaal Grant, Aviva Armour-Ostroff, and Laura Afelskie.
Charlie Kaufman has lent his name to the project as an executive producer, and while there is a definite sympathy between his imaginative approach and hers, Jaye's artistry comes through as purely hers, a true discovery.
Stylistically, Darkest Miriam feels a bit like an approximation of Atom Egoyan, broken into chapters and labelled with pretentious, overly flowery subheadings.
Style sometimes suffocates substance to the point that the film occasionally feels more like a Harbourfront modern dance piece than it does an engaging drama with burnt edges.