Film round up

Just some films I have enjoyed over the first few months of 2024.  

Nyad:   A film about one woman's determination to swim across the straits of Florida.  One of those films about individual grit and determination, and with great performances from Annette Benning and Jodie Foster.  My only problem with this is the same as with all of the 'individuals against the world' movies - it's good that they succeeded, but if only they could have put that effort and money into something that would made a difference to the world, rather than just to the individual in question. 

Everybody loves Jeanne:  A lovely little romance between two odd souls, Jeanne a bankrupt entrepreneur who invented a product to clean the oceans, and Jean, who is strange, but strangely optimistic despite mental health issues.  Quirky and sweet.

Joyland: The youngest son in a Pakistani family takes up a job as a backing dancer to a transgender performer, and his wife struggles to cope.  Sweet and sad, this is a film about everyone trapped in roles and with desires they don’t understand or know how to act upon.   Beautiful cinematography and I found it very moving.

One Life:  A moving sort of biopic about Nicholas 'Nicky' Winton, a banker turned activist, and the man who made the Czech equivalent of the kinder transport happen.  Great performances from the cast of Anthony Hopkins as the older Nicholas Winton, Johnny Flynn as the younger man, and Helena Bonham-Carter as Nicky's indomitable mother.   A moving story, and it was sad to see how little had changed really, looking at Whitehall and the government machine's indifference to suffering.

Fallen Leaves: Another odd couple romance, this time between Ansa, who works in a supermarket and gets fired for being cross about wasted food, and Holappa, an alcoholic construction worker who gets fired for drinking at work.  There's a meet at a Karoake bar, then a series of mishaps and miscommunications in classic romcom style, but with a deadpan humour and quirkiness underpinning it all.  

Anatomy of a fall: I loved this film which follows the investigation following the death of Samuel, an aspiring writer, and the trial of his wife Sandra (an impressive Sandra Hüller), also a writer, who happens to have written about a woman killing her husband.   The husband and wife literally speak different languages which is a bone of contention between them, and the film is in a mix of English, French and German.  It is layered with the investigations and trial which layer by layer uncover what lay within the marriage in forensic detail, whilst also asking questions about objective truths, and how marriage and life is made up of little moments that make a whole.  Perfectly played by Hüller, my sympathies and suspicions wavered right up to till the end.  I hope this wins awards.

The Holdovers: A gentle bittersweet film about a teacher, the school cook and a difficult student holed up in school over the Christmas break.  Paul Giamatti is wonderful as the cynical, world-weary teacher stuck in a rut, but all of these performances are spot on.  Set against the backdrop of the Vietnam war in the 70's, this is a warm and beautiful character piece but with some hard hits just under the surface.  Loved it. 

American Fiction:  A movie which takes aim at the way that Black stories are limited to trauma and poverty, the film has a writer trying to break the pattern.  Sharp, bitter and funny, and a bit meta.

Past lives - a story of missed love and what might have been.  The narrative follows Na-young and Hae-sung, firstly as children in Korea, before Na-young moves away to America and changes her name to Nora.  They catch up many years later over Facebook when they are in their 20s, but Na-young (now played as an adult by Greta Lee) ceases contact when she finds the friendship is holding her back.  The final section catches up with them again years later, when Hae-sung comes to meet Nora (now married and an aspiring scriptwriter) in New York.  The reconnection between the two, and with Nora's husband (John Magaro) is heartbreaking to watch.   Hae-sung (Teo Yoo) is unsophisticated but passionate and honourable, and Nora clearly still loves him even though she is now a sophisticated and cynical new yorker.  An old school romance movie in many ways, the title 'Past Lives' comes from the Korean idea of “in-yun”, of lovers in past lives meeting again.    

The Zone of Interest: I found this film deeply unsettling and I had trouble shaking off the heaviness I was left with by the end.  The film follows the commandant of Auschwitz, Rudolf Höss (Christian Friedel), and his wife, Hedwig (Sandra Hüller) and their five children as they live their lives in an idyllic country house abutting the walls of the concentration camp.   The family never acknowledge what is going on next door, despite screams, gunshots, rumbling noise from the complex and smoke from the chimneys as a constant backdrop.  The women sort through clothing from next door, gossiping about one of their friends taking a dress that was too small and belonged to 'a Jewess'.  When Hedwig's mother comes to visit we hear about her petty jealousies of her old Jewish neighbour  (she didn't get the curtains when the families possessions were shared out amongst the neighbours) and she speculates on whether they are now next door.   There is no sense here of anyone not knowing, or even of any guilt or horror.  Instead, the focus, particularly from Hedwig is all on maintaining the domestic bliss they feel they are owed.  The only single crack in that approach is from Hoss at the very end but it is minimal and a very private wobble, and he shakes it off and carries on regardless down into the abyss.  The most chilling film I have ever seen about the holocaust, it is still sitting with me, particularly answering that question of how people let such things happen.  With the awful things happening in the world today, this is a reminder that perfectly normal people can and will do terrible things. 

I also went to see All of Us Strangers for a second time, but as I have already written about it here  and here I won't go on, but I hope it gets some awards too!