Here is the first part of my take on some of the outstanding films at Sundance this year.
HOLD ONTO ME (Κράτα Με)
World Cinema Dramatic Competition, Cyprus/Denmark/Greece, In Greek with English subtitles
Myrsini Aristidou’s captivating, emotionally-rich debut feature HOLD ONTO ME should be considered by Cyprus to be its inaugural International Feature Oscar submission. This gritty, exquisite gem was shot entirely in Cyprus, and its writer-director is a prominent Cypriot. Granted I make this proclamation having not seen other eligible films from that country.
The film often evokes Peter Bogdanovich’s Paper Moon with the narrative focused on the complex relationship between 11-year-old Iris (a wondrous Maria Petrova) and her estranged, grifter father, Aris (the mesmerizing Christos Passalis), who she hasn’t seen in many years but apprehensively wants to get to know. The intrepid child discovers dad is back for his father’s funeral and follows him to a ramshackle shipyard where he’s attempting to fix a boat and hiding out from goons he is indebted to. Aris is initially unwelcoming but begins to use Iris in his cons and slowly develops deeper feelings. And when the narrative takes a perilous turn, Aris’s true nature is revealed, leading to quite the dramatic conclusion.
Gorgeously shot by Lasse Ulvedal Tolbøll, HOLD ONTO ME is a poignant, uncompromising look at a deeply flawed man, who is in no way searching for redemption, but finds it anyway. It strikes all the right notes right up until that nail-biting final sequence.
Passalis’s fearless, fascinating performance grounds the film. The actor looked so familiar to me and then I realized I had just watched Yorgos Lanthimos’s fabulous mindfuck, Dogtooth—his first film (and new on 4K). I was so impressed with him in that wacky movie and wondered what he had done, subsequently. It was quite the pleasant surprise to realize he’s lived up to the great promise he showed over 15 years ago. And then some!
Aristidou’s sublime film is a great sign of what will hopefully be another banner year for foreign-language films.
HOLD ONTO ME won the World Cinema Dramatic Audience Award.
WATCH The Contending Interview with Myrsini and Cristos HERE.
Tell Me Everything
World Cinema Dramatic Competition, Israel/France, In Hebrew with English subtitles
Moshe Rosenthal’s second feature, Tell Me Everything is a touching film that builds in intensity and had me tearing up near the end (a rare thing).
Set in the late 1980s, when AIDS was a death sentence and people were unclear about how it was transmitted, the film opens with a seemingly close and happy family on the verge of being torn apart. Twelve-year old Boaz (Yair Mazor) sees his father, Meir (Assi Cohen) in an intimate moment with another man and proceeds to tell his sisters about it. They, in turn, tell their mother and Meir is tossed out and shunned. When he attempts to see Boaz at his bar mitzvah, the boy narcs to his uncle and Meir is beaten up and sent away
The film, then flashes forward a decade and 22-year-old Boaz (now, Ido Tako), still guilty and confused, locates his dad in order to try and come to terms with his own shame, anger and fear, and, surprisingly, forms a new bond.
Cohen is heartbreakingly good as a father who, through being outed, is able to live a more genuine life.
Tako, so impressive in his brief role in Israel’s 2024 International Feature Oscar submission, Come Closer, plays the nuances and ambiguities of his part masterfully—we can both relate to him and wonder about who he will become.
There are so many different ways this film could have gone wrong, but thanks to an incredibly sensitive and realistic approach to the material, Rosenthal delivers a loving work, one that celebrates forgiveness, understanding and love—one where both central characters allow for empathy and acceptance.
WATCH The Contending Interview with Ido and Moshe HERE.
Shame and Money
World Cinema Dramatic Competition, Germany/Kosovo/Slovenia/Albania/North Macedonia/Belgium, In Albanian with English subtitles
Visar Morina’s Shame and Money begins intriguing enough as we meet a Kosovar family living in a small village struggling to make ends meet. Shaban (Astrit Kabashi) and his wife Hatixhe (Flonja Kodheli) are at the center of the story. And, initially, we are also introduced to two of Shaban’s brothers, but once the couple are forced to move to the big city of Pristina, the narrative drops both those characters—which is a shame since the more conniving brother, Liridon (Tristan Halilaj), was quite interesting.
Instead, we follow Shaban and Hatixhe as well as Shaban’s mother (a terrific Kumrije Hoxha) as they attempt to navigate their new digs in a far more capitalistic city
Shame, pride and dignity are key themes that are expounded on. Shaban is judged and judges himself via these three traits and is pushed to his limits.
I appreciated Marina’s humanistic and sometimes enigmatic approach, and the two central performances are excellent, but the film doesn’t quite live up to its ambitions. Still, it’s top-notch filmmaking and I applaud the filmmaker’s passion.
The film won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize.
Frank & Louis
Premieres, Switzerland/United Kingdom, In English
Kingsley Ben-Adir delivers a mesmerizing, multifaceted performance in Petra Biondina Volpe’s somber prison drama, Frank & Louis. And that is reason enough to recommend the film.
Frank (Ben-Adir) is in jail serving a life sentence for murder (when he was 16) and, in hopes of helping with his upcoming parole hearing, takes on the task of caregiver to a cantankerous inmate, Louis (Rob Morgan, touching) who is suffering from early onset Alzheimer’s and dementia. Louis used to be a terrifying thug who hurt and murdered other inmates. He’s now a shell of his former self.
Volpe gets the initial attitude towards someone with Alzheimer’s so right. As the caregiver to a father who had the disease, you do start out not believing the person, getting frustrated and impatient with them, even though you know they’re no longer the person you remember. Frank is initially exasperated by Louis until he realizes the situation. He then becomes more patient and begins to truly care about him which allows him to self-reflect.
The film asks key questions about justice and if people who can’t even recall their committed crime should continue to be punished—sadly, we can guess what side most Americans would be on in this argument.
Night Nurse
Next, United States
Georgia Bernstein’s debut feature, Night Nurse, is a wild bit of psychosexual fuckery.
Eleni (Cemre Paksoy) is a brand-new nurse who gets a job at a retirement community for the mostly-wealthy. Her new patient, Douglas (Bruce McKenzie) has all the signs of dementia, but Eleni soon learns that something else is afoot as other nurses tending to him seem to fall under his spell.
Meanwhile a series of major scams are being perpetrated on many of the elderly patients living in the community. Suffice to say (as to not ruin the shocks), these two plots may be related.
This is one looney, unsettling, yet enveloping indie — bold, perverse, fucking bizarre — that I didn’t necessarily enjoy, but I could not stop watching…or thinking about afterwards.
More to come…
