Films June 2016

I've watched only foreign language films this month. There's a good selection on Netflix. Foreign films enable you to see and enjoy locations you'd never normally see; they make you look at situations and people from an entirely different perspective and present you with ideas that make you think anew. I appreciate the slower pace of many foreign films: The pace, speed and superficiality of many English language films which are more commercial are annoying. I absolutely love subtitles!

Palm Trees In The Snow

2015 Spanish romantic drama directed by Fernando Gonzalez Molina. Shot in the Canary Islands,Huesca and Colombia. It was watchable but unexceptional. More could have been made of the fabulous locations. The love story between Kilian, the Spaniard from a family of cocoa growing colonialists and Bisila, a native of the island Fernando Poo, wasn't entirely convincing. Their romance begins when Kilian accidentally stumbles upon Bisila singing by a waterfall. The film proceeds on a series of cliches and has nothing new to say about colonialism.

Force Majeure

2015 film directed by Ruben Ostlund. This is a terrific film. A Swedish family on a skiing holiday is caught up in an avalanche. The father flees, leaving his wife and kids alone. The wife starts to unravel and question their relationship which begins to disintegrate. In her hurt and anger, the wife publicly exposes the husband's cowardice. The viewer is exposed to the painful dynamics of the family as it fragments. It invokes the most acute and embarrassing emotions as we are forced to view the husband's initial denial of his behaviour followed by his exposure and final acknowledgment of what he has done. For some of the time I was watching through my fingers. The husband's pain and embarrassment and the wife's suppressed fury is compelling. It's not a dark film however; there are many comic touches. The ending involves several twists and is unexpected.

No Filter

2016 Spanish movie directed by Nicolas Lopez. A woman visits a Chinese doctor who tells her that her chest pain is due to repressed rage and that the cure is to openly express how she feels. The results are comic and cathartic as she tells the people in her life what she really thinks of them. Definitely watchable.