International Oscar Hopefuls: TARIKA and PALESTINE 36

TARIKA (The Herd)
This soul crushing magical realistic tale is the Bulgarian Oscar entry.  The film is the story of a father and daughter living in the country side. They are outsiders and not really trusted. Traika, has developed butterfly wings disease, a condition that makes her bones brittle. Complicating matters is the fact that the village thinks the girl is cursed and the source of the bad luck that seems to have befallen the town.

Told largely through action not words, TARIKA is a tale of what it means to be a paret and how the the herd mentality can over take reason. Its a deliberately told tale that you have to go with and pay attention to because what it important is told in actions and not words. There are long silences. If you can go with its rhythms will leave you broken at then end

Recommended

PALESTINE 36
Palestine's entry to the Oscars is the story of a young man caught up in the politics and tensions of 1930's Palestine, where the influx of European Jews is turning the status quo upside down.

This is a solid historical drama that takes the current vogue of Palestine before the Second World War tales and tries to tell a large story than that of a family caught in the march of history. I mention this because PALESTINE 36 is one of a half dozen or more films that have come out this year set in the same period, and one of at least three that is in the Oscar mix.

Of many films of a similar subject this is probably the most conventionally told, but it is also the one trying to tell a larger scale story. We are introduced to a swath of people from various groups and we are given a wider look at the politics of what is going on.

While just as good as the other films on the subject, it stands out for not taking a similar path. At the same time it is hurt by being clumped together with films that are less conventional. Don't get me wrong, I like the film, but at the same time seeing it at the end of the year in the midst of Oscar talk, I found it hard to take on it's own terms. That said I will revisit down the road.

My peronal quibbles aside PALESTNE 36 is worth a look.