CODA (Subtitled) (12A)

Seventeen-year-old Ruby Rossi is a CODA, a child of deaf adults, and the only hearing member of a family of fishermen in Gloucester, Massachusetts. She nurtures a crush on classmate Miles and follows him into choir club. Inspirational music teacher Bernardo Villalobos recognises Ruby's raw talent and encourages her to pursue a scholarship to Berklee College of Music. However, leaving home is not an option.

LondonNet Film Review
CODA (15)

Seventeen-year-old Ruby Rossi (Emilia Jones) is a CODA, a child of deaf adults, and the only hearing member of a family of fishermen in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Before school, she works alongside her father Frank (Troy Kotsur) and older brother Leo (Daniel Durant) on the family’s boat. In the wider community, Ruby acts as a translator for the clan including her mother Jackie (Marlee Matlin), who gleefully meddles in her children’s love lives and believes that “Tinder is something we can all do as a family…”

In the classroom, Ruby nurtures a crush on Miles (Ferdia Walsh-Peelo) and she follows him into choir club. Inspirational music teacher Bernardo Villalobos (Eugenio Derbez) recognises Ruby’s raw talent and encourages her to pursue a scholarship to Berklee College of Music. “If you start beat boxing, that cup clapping thing, we’re done,” jokes best friend Gertie (Amy Forsyth). However, leaving home is not an option.

CODA is an English language remake of the charming French film La Famille Belier and relocates the intergenerational angst to working class New England. Writer-director Sian Heder does not hit one bum note with her uplifting rites of passage drama, which forces Ruby to choose between her dreams and familial responsibilities to a feelgood soundtrack, beautifully sung by Jones. The London-born actress perfectly captures the inner turmoil of a teenager, who fears her family are helpless without her. Interactions with deaf co-stars Matlin, Kotsur and Durant deliver bountiful laughs and cues a life-affirming final chorus that manages to have us smiling deliriously through torrents of hot tears.

– Jo Planter