Cult film director who works in advertising has a panic attack and decides to go away…
...however...
...she is a character created by a film director writing a new screenplay for his first film in five years that is based on the people around him
Pedro Aldomavar returns with a good, but lesser by his standards, film that seems less a finished film then an effort to keep his regular trip to the festivals going (a point mentioned in the film). Honestly if it wasn’t Pedro this film would never have gotten into many festivals. (And I am pointing this out in a year I published a piece taking the NYFF to task about all the Hong Sang-soo films- because it clearly isn't just Sang-soo getting special treatment)
That should not be read as it being bad, it is not, more that the film is full of ideas, and scenes, but there is very little to tie them together. Even if the film with in a film doesn't all tie together, its being written as we watch, the real world should all hang together. It might have worked if there was an ending but there really isn’t one, just a place where it stops.
Part of the problem is that the “real world” characters feel less constructed. What we get from them is really from the film with in the film counterparts and that isn’t always accurate. I have no real sense of them other than as mouthpieces for Pedro’s words.
At the same time the ideas about grief, reality, creation are stunning. Pedro has a great deal to say about a lot of things; he just doesn’t have a narrative to hang them on.
I like the film, but as I said above this is a lesser film from a great director and exists just to get him into a festival.
Still if you are a fan it’s a must.
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