I think I'm being unkind giving this film a 9. It's as close to perfection for such a simple film as it's likely to get.
I'll try my best not to include spoilers, but it's difficult not to give too much away.
Okay, where do I start? The performance of the mother in this film is simply mesmerising, the raw emotion of dealing with grief, the pent-up anger at the reaction of her husband.
The film is beautifully shot in black and white, with only a brief flirt with colour. As a film person, I was struggling to work out how the director achieved one shot overlooking a field, that looked like a tracking shot, but wasn't.
One of the most original and moving funeral sequences that I have ever seen, a long lingering shot from a short distance, leaving the family and friends to their privacy.
I cried at one point, I am not ashamed to say. If you see the film, it will probably have the same effect on you, a classroom scene without the class. And a daughter trying to reach out to her father but her father not seeing (again trying not to give too much away!) I hope this film gets a cinema release in the UK, somehow I doubt it will, which would be a real shame. The best film I saw at Cannes by a country mile and also one of the best films I have seen in a very long time. A great example of how to squeeze the maximum out of very simple subject matter.
A real surprise and a revelation.
I'll try my best not to include spoilers, but it's difficult not to give too much away.
Okay, where do I start? The performance of the mother in this film is simply mesmerising, the raw emotion of dealing with grief, the pent-up anger at the reaction of her husband.
The film is beautifully shot in black and white, with only a brief flirt with colour. As a film person, I was struggling to work out how the director achieved one shot overlooking a field, that looked like a tracking shot, but wasn't.
One of the most original and moving funeral sequences that I have ever seen, a long lingering shot from a short distance, leaving the family and friends to their privacy.
I cried at one point, I am not ashamed to say. If you see the film, it will probably have the same effect on you, a classroom scene without the class. And a daughter trying to reach out to her father but her father not seeing (again trying not to give too much away!) I hope this film gets a cinema release in the UK, somehow I doubt it will, which would be a real shame. The best film I saw at Cannes by a country mile and also one of the best films I have seen in a very long time. A great example of how to squeeze the maximum out of very simple subject matter.
A real surprise and a revelation.