The Dig (2021)

Direction: Simon Stone
Country: UK

This second directorial effort from Simon Stone, a British actor turned director, is set in Suffolk, England, on the eve of WWII. Investing more than anything in its characters, the powerfully performed The Dig was adapted with satisfactory results by Moira Buffini (Jane Eyre, 2011; Byzantium, 2012) from the 2007 novel of the same name by John Preston. Carey Mulligan and Ralph Fiennes lead a soberly efficient cast, playing Edith Pretty, a landowner with an interest in archeology, and Basil Brown, an experienced excavator, respectively. 

After discovering an Anglo-Saxon ship and other valuable relics buried for centuries in the Sutton Hoo, both will learn to deal with the tactless and domineering C.W. Philips (Ken Stott), a Cambridge archeologist who likes to have his own way.

Navigating the story’s period is easy since it was depicted with attention to detail, benefitting from the formidably composed images captured by the lens of Mike Eley (The Selfish Giant, 2013; Marley, 2012; and a few Roger Mitchell films). As a tolerable subplot, there’s this ruined marriage between the avid-for-love Peggy (Lily James) and the closeted gay Stuart Piggott (Ben Chaplin), two members of Philips team, who finally put an end in their relationship as their romantic interests are redirected.

Unfolding methodically with no ambiguities, the storytelling flows with interest but never reaches a climax per se as a consequence of scarce suspenseful moments. Instead, it burns with a constant flame that, never eradicating enjoyment, emits a light that never expands with novelty or surprise.

The Night (2021)

Direction: Kourosh Ahari
Country: USA

The third feature from Iranian director Kourosh Ahari, The Night, is a psychological thriller impregnated with ghosts that slowly plunges the viewer into its nightmarish scenario. The story, written by Ahari and Milad Jarmooz, lives uniquely from the mood and plays with something that no one is indifferent nowadays - being trapped with no control at all from a particularly unpleasant situation. 

In this case, an Iranian man (Shahab Hosseini, a regular in Asghar Farhadi’s films) living in the US for some time becomes prisoner of ghostly forces in a Los Angeles hotel together with his recently arrived wife (Niousha Noor) and baby daughter. The energy that surrounds them is adverse, starting with a displaced man (Elester Latham) who repeats unintelligible phrases, a sinister receptionist (George Maguire) who disturbs with his conversation, graceless presences as well as baffling disappearances and pranks. Heavily contributing to the atmosphere, the details do matter in the development of the story, but they also convey a sense of messiness in the way they are mounted. 

The visuals, not being particularly artful, are adequate, while the symbology linked to some sort of curse along with the necessity to extract the hidden truth from the Naderi family, play key factors here. Still, the film results more formulaic than twisted, and the minimally unsettling situations that occur in a blink of an eye are powerless to prevent it from sinking into the shadows of oblivion.  

As a curiosity, this is the first American-made film to receive permission to be screened in Iran since 1979. 

The White Tiger (2021)

Direction: Ramin Bahrani
Country: India / USA

A successful and confident Indian entrepreneur named Balram Halwai (Adarsh Gourav in his first leading role) tells his own story, describing step by step how he transitioned from darkness to light. Born to a lower-caste family in Laxmangarh, India, Balram is cautiously ambitious when he decides to move to Delhi and become the driver of The Stork (Mahesh Manjrekar), the former landlord of his poor hometown.

Although doing financially better than everyone else in his family, he remains a servant tied to tradition, being often mistreated and humiliated by his employer. However, the latter’s son, Ashok (Rajkummar Rao), who embraces progressive ideas due to the influence of his New York-raised wife Pinky (Priyanka Chopra), picks him as his own chauffeur. Lucky him! Yet, an unexpected and traumatic incident involving the aforementioned couple takes him to uncomfortable places.

Under the attentive direction of Iranian-American Ramin Bahrani (Chop Shop, 2007; Goodbye Solo, 2018; 99 Homes, 2014), who based himself on Arvind Adiga’s 2008 novel of the same name, The White Tiger is assembled with intelligence, humor and horror. It works on several levels, challenging us to think about the submissiveness and enslavement of people from these lower castes, who have to figure out the best way to survive, as well as the supremacy and abusive behavior of those in the higher castes, which in this particular case is aggravated by bribery. The moral concerns haven’t stop here since the means employed by Balram to achieve success also come to the table.

With strong acting and vivid narration, The White Tiger provides a darkly triumphant on-screen experience.

A White, White Day (2020)

Direction: Hlynur Palmason
Country: Iceland

The second feature from writer/director Hlynur Palmason (Winter Brothers, 2017) is a grim tale of grief, jealousy and anger set in a remote Icelandic town and centered on the unpredictable Ingimundur (Ingvar Sigurdsson), an off duty cop who, after losing his wife to a fatal car accident, becomes obsessed in finding more about the local man he suspects to have had an affair with her.   

Unable to properly mourn his loss, Ingimundur is examined and evaluated by a psychiatrist. Having said that, if we take his impulsive actions and confrontational gestures as examples, and mix them with a strong sense of pride and an uncontrolled rage, it’s easy to conclude that he’s far from being ok and might even pose a danger to others. Things will get even tenser to viewers after they realize that Salka (Ída Mekkín Hlynsdóttir), his eight-year-old granddaughter, becomes unnecessarily exposed to his irrationality. The thought of a child being scared and traumatized like this made me look at Ingimundur with loathing.

The committed acting from Sigurdsson, whose disarming demeanors can quickly swell from hushed to howling, is the main reason why this impressively mounted film works so well. Moreover, the awesome visuals are fine-tuned to the profoundly stirring if occasionally infuriating story.

Being as much harrowing as entertaining, A White, White Day will likely be considered thought-provoking for the ones interested in an atypically disturbing character study.

House of Hummingbird (2020)

Direction: Bora Kim
Country: South Korea

Bora Kim writes and directs her first feature film, House of Hummingbird, with observant precision without ever losing sight of the main character’s feelings. Yet, the story, based on her own childhood memories and experiences, is told with agonizing restraint, becoming a little overlong while presenting a whole not quite equal to some of its parts.

In 1994 Seoul, 14-year-old Eun-hee (Ji-hu Park) tries to figure ways to repair the quotidian struggles that push her down as the environment at home is frequently stressful and both her friendships and amorous relationships marked by disappointment. There’s also a corrigible health problem and an impeding pressure for the grades that would take her to the coveted Seoul University. Feeling no support, she finally finds the attention she deserves when a perceptive new teacher, Yong-ji (Sae-byeok Kim), shows availability, giving her a rare chance to open up. 

Ms. Kim refuses to play the melodrama and deserves an extra point for that, but the film lacks that emotional punch in the story and nuance in the characters that would have grabbed me in a different way. The most praiseworthy aspect here is Park’s assured performance, which helps to put an honest touch in the proceedings. While attempting to find her own space, Eun-hee is not afraid to give a step forward and probe alternative directions that could bring her less suffering. And that, by itself, is laudable.

About Endlessness (2020)

Direction: Roy Andersson
Country: Sweden

The singularity of Roy Andersson’s works has been casting a spell on viewers since the early 1970’s. Acclaimed works such as A Swedish Love Story (1970), Songs From the Second Floor (2000), You The Living (2007) and A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence (2014) have now the company of About Endlessness, his latest meditation on the human nature, which tells more about life than you might think.

The film, sketchy, simple and sublime, is structured with various vignettes - an envious man gets irritated because a former school mate doesn’t salute him; a priest who lost his faith keeps dreaming with his own crucifixion; two lovers fly over the city of Cologne in ruins; in a fish market, a jealous man slaps the woman he loves; a stressed out dentist abandons work as a patient screams with pain; in a coffee shop, a hopeful man asks all the present: ‘isn’t all this fantastic?’. 

These are some of the stories that the 77-year-old Swedish director prepared for us. They are made of encounters, lost people, uncomfortable waits, surrealism, nightmares, death, and trivial incidents. Attached to these elements we have feelings of regret, sadness, joy, resentment, anguish, all wrapped in a thin layer of sarcasm. It’s hard to imagine any other director depicting life and human nature this way, where there are parts of disarming sincerity counterbalanced by a nearly absurdist humor. 

The cascading imagery evokes deep feelings and some segments are deepened with classical and jazz music. It's a powerful film, equal parts defeatist and exultant.

Siberia (2020)

Direction: Abel Ferrara
Country: Italy / Germany / other

Populated by recollections, disturbing dreams, inner fears, symbology, conjuration and eroticism, Siberia, the second film of Abel Ferrara starring Willem Dafoe in 2020, fascinates with some scattered opaque scenes but ultimately disappoints. 

Dafoe is Clint, a man looking for his lost soul in a remote Siberian place where he used to go fishing with his late father. The film is brusquely edited, displaying a few bizarre scenes that are intertwined with ghostly appearances and inexplicable interactions, suggesting relationships that the movie only hints at. With the backdrop continually changing from the snowy desolation to the desert to the woods, the film throws in a great number of elements without revealing things clearly. It hides instead, merging visual bafflement and philosophical inquiry. Hence, it wouldn't really surprise me if some viewers found the results tactless, since Ferrara loses momentum in tacking countless details that become inconsequent and abominably tireless with the time.

Unlike the engrossing Tommaso, Ferrara’s previous work, Siberia is a dysfunctional film whose sweeping ambition falls short of consistent narrative moments and, according to that, is forced to deal with its monumental incapacity to create a cohesive whole. An artistic sabotage, I dare to say.

Another Round (2020)

Direction: Thomas Vinterberg
Country: Denmark

Another Round, the 13th feature from Danish director Thomas Vinterberg (The Celebration, 1998; The Hunt, 2012), focuses on four disappointed high school teachers who decide to put in practice a debatable theory from Norwegian psychiatrist Finn Skårderud, which defends that men should maintain a certain amount of alcohol in their blood to improve relaxation and creativity. The idea came from Martin (Mads Mikkelsen), a History teacher, whose plan was forged under the sudden pressure of becoming a more motivating teacher at school as well as a better and more communicative husband at home. He is joined by fellow teachers Nikolaj (Magnus Millang), Tommy (Thomas Bo Larsen) and Peter (Lars Ranthe).

The positive results were pretty much immediate for all, and the usual lifeless classes and despondent mood were replaced by an inspirational approach and some propulsive emotions. The four then decide to raise the alcohol intake for a better performance and further analysis, but while the party time remains exciting, the unhinged disintegration that comes next is pretty ugly. 

Despite the consequences of this deliberate intoxication, the film is never downbeat, rather preferring to look ahead. It’s directly connected to alcoholism but it’s also about life itself and the emotional stagnation and frustration that may come from its routines. The ensemble cast is competent while the sober Vinterberg, who collaborated once more with Tobias Lindholm (A Highjacking, 2012; A War, 2015) in the script, grounds the action firmly in the fantastic camaraderie shared by the friends. The film was awarded distinctive prizes at the BFI London and San Sebastian film festivals.

The Personal History of David Copperfield (2020)

Direction: Armando Iannucci
Country: UK

Gifted Scottish director Armando Iannucci (In the Loop, 2009; The Death of Stalin, 2017) applies some nice chops and twists to the life of Charles Dicken’s famous character, David Copperfield, in his latest comedy starring Dev Patel, Tilda Swinton and Hugh Laurie.

Over the course of this eccentrically mounted account, Copperfield (Patel) narrates his own life, from birth to the present day, going overboard with a couple imaginary characters as well as describing real relationships. We learn about the peculiarities in the character of his aunt Betsy (Swinton) and her fantastic, if childish, cousin Mr. Dick (Laurie); the fondness for the eternally indebted Mr. Micawber (Peter Capaldi); a momentary yet uncontrollable passion for Dora Spenlow (Morfydd Clark); and his real love for Agnes Wickfield (Rosalind Eleazar), a childhood friend. Those who read the novel  certainly remember the villains Uriah Heep (Ben Whishaw), a cunning and malicious law clerk, and Edward Murdstone (Darren Boyd), Copperfield’s cruel stepfather.

This comedic version of the novel comes imbued with cultural diversity as well as audacity in the details. The presence of Ms. Swinton is noticeable, but even more baffling is how she manages to steal the show whenever on the scene. In point of fact, what should be unwatchable becomes a mildly agreeable parody with a distinctive satirical treatment in the hands of this director. You'll likely forgive any obtuse idea and lopsided circumstance he might throw at you.

Even not reaching the levels of wit and absurdity offered in The Death of Stalin, this Copperfield keeps us thinking of Iannucci as a stalwart architect of the modern comedy genre. 

The Life Ahead (2020)

Direction: Edoardo Ponti
Country: Italy

Based on the 1975 novel The Life Before Us by French author Romain Gary, The Life Ahead is one of those sad cases where the execution fails to do justice to a potentially great story. While we bath in the competent cinematography of Angus Hudson, the tediousness associated to the clichés allowed by director Edoardo Ponti becomes the film’s worst enemy. Aggravating the scenario, the soundtrack is tacky, while the scenes, one after another, lack authenticity.

The story follows Momo (Ibrahima Gueye), a 12-year-old Senegalese orphan living in an Italian seaside town.  He's under the care of the aging Dr. Cohen (Renato Carpentieri), who entrusts him to the Jewish former prostitute Madame Rosa (the great Sophia Loren in her second collaboration with her son Ponti), a former prisoner in Auschwitz.

While the latter is giving occasional signs of dementia, Momo, recently expelled from school, works for a local drug dealer (Massimiliano Rossi). The anger mixed with the bad influences presumably make him a dangerous kid, but both Rosa’s friends - Lola (Abril Zamora), a former male boxing champ turned trans mother, and Hamil (Babak Karimi), a generous Muslim owner shop - see the contrary.

The performance of the young debutant actor has proved to be the most positive aspect of an unsatisfying tale where the energy peters out at a high speed, leaving you empty. Shamelessly manipulative, this formulaic debacle fails to offer something new; and even more important, something solid.

One Night in Miami (2021)

Direction: Regina King
Country: USA

Actress-turned-director Regina King (If Beale Street Could Talk, 2018) joins forces with screenwriter Kemp Powers, who adapted his own stage play of the same name, in order to dramatize a more-stressful-than-expected fictional meeting at the Hampton House Hotel in 1964 Florida between legendary boxer Cassius Clay, singer/songwriter Sam Cooke, NFL hero Jim Brown and civil rights activist Malcolm X. These characters are compellingly portrayed by Eli Goree, Leslie Odom Jr., Aldis Hodge and Kingsley Ben-Adir, respectively. 

Bolstered by thoughtful and insightful dialogue, One Night in Miami aims at the same racial problems that America still faces today. By combining in a simple episode biting wit, some high spirits, considerable tension and constructive verbal aggressiveness, the film is a talkfest that heads to important places without losing the focus on the subject. The religious topic comes tagged along, with Clay’s imminent transition to the Nation of Islam (after which he got the name Muhammad Ali) being shrouded in doubt.

Clay, who had won his first heavyweight boxing title that night, had been spiritually mentored by Malcolm, a responsible Muslim minister and family man who constantly fears for his life for defending racial equality in a divided and segregated America. The latter becomes front and center in the dramatic evolve of the story as he demands more from his three famous friends in the fight against the white oppressors. Furthermore, he announces his intention to leave the Nation of Islam to found his own organization, causing Clay to feel betrayed.

Anchored by powerful performances and rendered with both incisiveness and fluidity, this intelligently scripted film captivates our attention uninterruptedly. It comes at the right time, when the world needs equality, peace and understanding to move forward.

The Father (2021)

Direction: Florian Zeller
Country: UK / France

As a sharply observed drama, The Father is something you should not want to miss. The French director and co-writer Florian Zeller based himself on his own play, which premiered in 2012, finding superlative performances in Olivia Colman and especially Anthony Hopkins, an absolute authority in this demanding role. The latter is Anthony, a retired octogenarian engineer based in London, who has been gradually losing his mental faculties to dementia while refusing any help from the carers provided by his older daughter, Anne (Colman). 

Because in Anthony’s twisted mind there’s never a certainty, we sometimes are led to believe that his daughter is moving to Paris with her boyfriend, while other times we figure that he’s staying in her apartment, where her husband Paul (Rufus Sewell) also lives. Thus, the motivation for the viewer is also to find out what’s real and what’s not. But whereas Paul is always involved in contentious situations with the aging man, the new carer, Laura (Imogen Poots), is surprisingly tolerated just because she looks like Anthony’s youngest and favorite daughter, Lucy. According to him, she is a painter traveling the world. Whenever he compares his two daughters, the words are so blunt and offensive that they become bitterly funny.

The film, mounted in an absorbing way, carries an emotional weight and a permanent tension that it’s like having Bergman and Haneke crossing styles. Anthony’s lonely and desperate reality comes with a sense of closure; it can trigger moments of tenderness, mad obsession, anguish, extreme confidence and intense fragility.

I loved every minute of this touching film, which, perfectly conveying the state of confusion that its main character is immersed in, also benefits from the discipline of Zeller’s direction.

I'm No Longer Here (2020)

Direction: Fernando Frias
Country: Mexico / USA

Fernando Frias’ I’m No Longer Here chronicles a typical immigrant song centered on an atypical character. 17-year-old Ulises Sampiero (Daniel Garcia Treviño) has a passion for cumbia dance and leads a non-violent gang called Los Terkos in the slums of Monterrey, Mexico. Wearing large clothes and boasting a peculiar hair style that brings me back some Japanese Manga characters, Ulises takes care of a bunch of young people in the tough streets of his neighborhood. However, an altercation with a member of another gang takes him to Queens, New York. 

The American dream simply didn’t work for him. Undocumented, homeless and with no steady job, Ulises can only rely on his friends Lin (Angelina Chen), a 16-year-old who seems excited to meet him, and Gladys (Adríana Arbelaez), a Colombian prostitute who likes the same music as him. 

Presented in a non-chronological way, the film is culturally interesting, but becomes a frustrating viewing as it advances. The developments are slow, deliberate and mournful, and even throwing the music factor in the mix, the tone remains austere, the expressiveness limited and the articulation of the scenes too calculated.

I felt some closeness with the fact that Ulises got caught in a mess that makes him unfit for New York and his hometown alike, but at the same time I struggled with the torpid aimlessness that marks the story. Not lost, but bored in translation and discontent with the excessive dance scenes. Nevertheless, I still think there’s something to be found here.

Rocks (2020)

Direction: Sarah Gavron
Country: UK

The pungent third feature film from British director Sarah Gavron (Suffragette) feels authentic as it describes the struggle of a black teenage girl, Shola ‘Rocks’ Omotoso (newcomer Bukky Bakray), who is forced to take care of her little brother (D'angelou Osei Kissiedu) after their single mother has suddenly abandoned the household. The story, written by Theresa Ikoko and Claire Wilson, is set in East London, and besides the personal distress endured by the title character, it depicts the city’s cultural diversity with a honest look and vivid colors. 

Having the British social services trying to locate her, Shola asks her best friend Sumaya (Kosar Ali) to stay at her place. Sometimes she has no other choice than put herself in bad situations in order to obtain what she needs, while on other occasions she becomes a victim of racial discrimination. With a similar ambivalence, there are circumstances in which she plays the responsible adult, while others show how immature and insolent she can be. Despite embracing the undeserved burden with guts, we mustn’t forget she’s a teenager after all.  

Rocks is a sweeping and courageous coming-of-age tale filled with tense dramatic moments, pivoting on the realistic performances of a cast that makes these ordinary lives ring true.

It’s not always a smooth ride, but it’s richly humane. Luckily, there’s a satisfaction to be found in the optimistic finale, and you would have to be a real insensitive person not to be drawn in.

Queen & Slim (2020)

Direction: Melina Matsoukas
Country: USA

In Queen & Slim, the first feature film from music video maker Melina Matsoukas, a pacific ordinary man and an exhausted lawyer are forced to radically change their lives after an eventful first date in Ohio. Following dinner at a local restaurant, Slim and Queen - played by Daniel Kaluuya and Jodie Turner-Smith, respectively - are pulled over by a ruthless white cop with a known past of prejudice against African-Americans. 

Slim kills the policeman, acting in self defense after being unreasonably threatened. The couple then flees to New Orleans, where they expect to be received by Earl (Bokeem Woodbine), Queen’s estranged uncle. After realizing that the media incriminates them without evidence, a new plan arises: to reach Miami and, from there, take a plane to Cuba where they should find the safety they’re looking for.

Aligning a lot of incidents en route, this quite enjoyable road trip written by Lena Waithe, takes an unexpected bad turn to hell just one step away from heaven. Although boasting opposite postures, the two protagonists gradually develop a strong chemistry. The fine performances sustain the film’s electrifying premise.

As a thriller/romance hybrid, Queen & Slim satisfies as it boasts adequate dynamics within a decently structured framework. Yet, if some segments feel a bit stretched, trying to get noticed through glamorous visuals, some others are not new at all. It’s an uneven, if watchable, lovers-on-the-lam film.

News of the World (2021)

Direction: Paul Greengrass
Country: USA

Adapted from Paulette Jiles' 2016 novel of the same name, News of the World is a satisfying Western with a dramatic expansion and a few exciting shootouts that will keep you interested. The film reunites the English writer/director Paul Greengrass, widely recognized by a number of historical, criminal and politically motivated fact-based thrillers (Bloody Sunday, 2002; United 93, 2006; Captain Phillips, 2013) as well as some espionage fiction (three installments of the Bourne action series), and the celebrated American actor Tom Hanks.

After playing Captain Richard Phillips with zeal, the latter impersonates another Captain here - Jefferson Kyle Kidd, a Civil War veteran who left his wife in San Antonio to read the freshest news from town to town. In a Texas village, he bumps into a 10-year-old double orphan girl, Johanna (Helena Zengel), who lost her German parents and then the Kiowa family who raised her. Kidd promises to take her to her only living relatives, an aunt and an uncle, who live in a remote place in Castroville. Along the way, he finds greedy outlaws, exploiters and racists, but also some good souls that, even not preventing startling incidents, will help him to accomplish the task.

Although occasionally bumpy, it’s not my plan to discourage you from watching the film. To a degree, it employs the same stereotyped good and bad characters of the Western genre, but extends its views with the topics of loss and abandonment.

The main issue I’ve found here has to do with the predictability of the story, while the goodhearted central character, who always does the right thing even if he has to reverse its primary decisions, becomes the strongest inspirational factor. More surprises and conflicts would have taken it to more enjoyable places, though.

The Woman Who Ran (2020)

Direction: Hong Sang-soo
Country: South Korea

As usual, the prolific Korean director Hong Sang-soo brings his realism to the fore in his 24th drama, The Woman Who Ran, a simplistic and quotidian account of three different encounters in the outskirts of Seoul involving a common subject, Gamhee (Sang-soo’s muse Kim Minhee). The latter is a married woman who has never been apart from her translator husband in five years of marriage except for the occasions that this film portray. 

At first, she visits her good-natured friend Youngsoon (Seo Younghwa), a divorcee who lives in the countryside and needs time for herself. Youngsoon lives with a roommate, Youngji (Lee Eunmi), and both feed stray cats, a detail that upsets a newly arrived neighbor. The second visit takes her to a fun urban neighborhood where Suyoung (Song Seonmi), a dance producer and pilates teacher, bought an apartment with a view to the Inwangsan Mountain. This friend is emotionally involved with the architect that lives above her, but keeps being stalked by a young poet with whom she had a one-night stand. The third and most painful encounter happens at an independent cinema where she bumps into her former lover, now a famous director, and her ex-friend, Woojin (Kim Saebyuk), who married him.

Clearly, the central topic here is the obsessed idea of living glued to a husband, but there are also past issues in need of inner resolution. 

As the natural performances define feelings and shape characters, the film, mounted with incredible sobriety, adopts a minimalistic trait that fully depends on the actors’ proficiency. While the enigmatic title makes us suspect that Gamhee is running from her current life, the static camera work with urgent closeups and languid long takes are never synonym of emotional aridness.

Minari (2021)

Direction: Lee Isaac Chung
Country: USA

Writer-director Lee Isaac Chung’s semi-autobiographical family drama set in 1980’s, Minari, is certainly a serious competitor for the best film of the year. Accumulating moments of truth and insight, the film follows a Korean-American family - Jacob Yi (Steven Yeun), his wife Monica (Han Ye-ri) and their two kids, Anne (Noel Kate Cho) and David (Alan Kim) - that relocates to rural Arkansas to start over again and try to fix what went wrong in California. The couple had already agreed and arranged the details to work at a local poultry farm, but living in a caravan in the middle of nowhere was sort of a shock for Monica, who expected more for a matured, married couple.

This option had to do entirely with Jacob’s dream of owning a 50-acre piece of land where he could grow Korean vegetables and sell to the immigrant community, a task he undertakes with the help of an ultra-religious local, Paul (Will Patton). Meanwhile, the sensitive seven-year-old David has a weak heart and his blood pressure needs to be monitored every day. His health starts to improve after the arrival of his atypical yet incredibly warm grandmother (Youn Yuh-jung), the responsible for the funniest situations in the film. 

This lovely piece of work combines dramatic sweep and aesthetic power, providing a sublimely moving experience that stays with us long after the final credits roll. It’s all very real, narrated with poise and shot with a glowing perspective that encompasses compassion, intimacy, suffering and resilience. A tough-minded tale that is impossible to resist as it expertly captures the daily life of these empathetic characters with candor. Only rarely is a film this observant, and it felt good to see that director Chung (Munyurangabo) didn't opt to sacrifice narrative identity in favor of tone. In this case, one can’t live without the other. The encouraging finale is left open to our imagination in a memorable portrait of an immigrant family in search of its own dream.

Promising Young Woman (2020)

Direction: Emerald Fennell
Country: UK / USA

Promising Young Woman marks the feature directorial debut of English actress turned director Emerald Fennell. This hybridized solution of rape revenge thriller and eruptive romance works pretty well thanks to a top-tier performance by Carey Mulligan (An Education, 2009; Suffragette, 2015; Never Let Me Go, 2010). She is Cassie, a 30-year-old medical school quitter who has been living in grief since she lost her best friend, a victim of rape while drunk at a school party. 

Having no social life whatsoever aside from working in a small cafe during the day is a source of deep concern to her parents with whom she lives for seven years. Notwithstanding, she keeps secret her high-risk night-time activity, even further when Dr. Ryan Cooper (Bo Burnham), a former classmate who always had a crush on her, appears out of nowhere to infuse some hope in her inconsolable life.

Expertly written and stringently executed, the film flows effortlessly within a well-mounted narrative structure; things only tremble in the very last chapter. Symbolizing the indignation of all women who had to deal with the torments of extreme sexism, Mulligan exhibits a previously unseen range of talent. Although this isn’t the best movie that could have been made about the subject, it’s invariably entertaining, filled with interesting moments en route to an unorthodox ending.

Nomadland (2021)

Direction: Chloé Zhao
Country: USA

Based on Jessica Bruder’s 2017 novel Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century, this drama film radiates optimism and freedom, benefiting from a warm direction by Chloé Zhao, who already had caused a sensation with The Rider in 2017.

Nomadland follows one year of struggle and self-discovery in the life of Fern (the impeccable Frances McDormand), a recent widow and former employee of the extinct US Gypsum plant in Empire, Nevada. She now lives in an old, démodé RV, but, as she makes sure to clarify, she’s houseless, not homeless. 

Because anticipating retirement wouldn't provide her enough to live, she keeps searching for seasonal jobs here and there as she travels the West part of the country. This lifestyle is marked by so many hellos and goodbyes, some of them special and involving unforgettable people. These are the cases of fellow nomads David (David Strathairn), Linda (Linda May) and Swankie (Charlene Swankie). It's curious to notice that the latter two are real-life nomads who contribute authenticity to a tactful story that completely eschews sentimentality.

Despite the setbacks and afflictions during the journey, I see Fern’s human experience as immensely rich and illuminating. It’s peaceful in a certain way to see that Fern never deviates from who she is. Loneliness, the economic struggle and the nomadic life are stripped to the bones, providing a raw and touching cinematic experience that will heavily reward those with the courage to embrace it and feel it. 

Inundated with affection, Nomadland goes into uncharted territories, and if there’s aridness in the landscape, then barely none of it inhabits the heart of these compassionate travelers.