The Souvenir

This film tells the story of a film student who has an unreliable boyfriend.

Just five minutes in, I already found the film very boring. There is little story. Even if there was a story, it was told in a really boring way. There were shots that meant nothing, such as the guy going into the kitchen scrubbing, or Tilda Swinton going into the kitchen seemingly to work on the oven. These scenes told nothing, and weren't followed up. Scenes were mostly static, and the contents were very mundane. I found it horrendous.

I usually get in line to see a film that has anything to do with A24 film producers. Also 92/100 meta critic rating! Were they watching the same film! It was so boring and has nothing going for it. The characters are not interesting and the story is pointless. The critics are dead wrong about this one in my opinion. Avoid at all costs! It'll bore you to death, that coming from a guy who loves slow burn films.

Another film from Joanna Hogg brings another portrait of emotionally repressed, deeply unhappy members of the upper middle classes. To make things worse, the film relies on the over-familliar trope of the struggles of a would-be artist (the most boring of all subjects for an artist to consider), in this case a young woman contemporary to the director and with an apparent aspiration to become a Hogg-like film-maker. In places the film seems to acknowlege the inherent ridiculousness of its protagonist; but she recieves a sympathetic treatment. Hogg's style is frankly bizarre: the opposite of melodramatic, she prefers to show her characters going quielty about their business in the aftermath of unseen trauma. Even the wider structure of the film seems (deliberatley) artless, things happen (mostly offscreen) but there's no attempt to construct a plot in the orthodox sense, to manipulate the sequence of events to create a well-paced story. In general, I hate Hollywood blockbusters with their predictable narrative arcs, and love a good piece of miserablism; but the director has to meet me half-way. In fact, although I was profoundly irritated for the film's first half, I found the remainder more watchable than Hogg's two previous movies. But the basic subject (naive woman whose boyfriend is a heroin addict) was covered with far more wit and perception by Rachel Cusk in her first novel 'Saving Agnes', without the same level of underlying self-regard.

Being in love has this cunning way of tricking your brain into seeing no flaw in the person you're fixated upon. When people around you scream "dump him!", you turn a blind eye and convince yourself that the person you love is not the monster they say he is. The person you love will always be the most charming and kind, even when they're not.

The Souvenir tells a story about a privileged film student who involves herself in an intense relationship with a shady older man, who is full of charisma.

I can definitely see why this film is getting mixed ratings. The pacing was rather slow and the story was under-dramatized. I see a lot of reviewers really disliking this film due to the unbearable toxic romance between the two characters. I mean, I can somewhat agree. Seriously, just break up already! But sometimes relationships are just... like that. People often stay in toxic situations even if they can clearly see the red flags. People cling on to the slightest glisten of hope when everything is falling apart. As they say, it really... do be like that.

I loved the cinematic direction they took in this film. I felt like I was looking into the memories of the protagonist. The faded dream-like colour scheme really pulls the film together. I was really lured into the soft pastel universe that was created on screen. Did I mention how much I loved the cinematics?

What I couldn't see past was how unlikeable Julie and Anthony are. Julie is a privileged film student that tries really hard to be interesting, and Anthony is this pretentious, manipulative douchebag of a person. I just can't seem to find any redeeming qualities in the characters, which makes it hard for me to fully connect with this story. But maybe this film wasn't made for the viewer to be connected to any of the characters. Maybe this film was made to be consumed as what it is. A naive girl falling in love with a secretive older man.

Nevertheless, The Souvenir really made me sit and ponder about the film a lot. I'm still processing the emotions I've felt throughout the film and that should be enough for me to give it a good enough rating. I just wish it could've resonated with me in a stronger way.

Let me get this out of the way first - just because Tom Burke, Honor Swinton Byrne & Tilda Swinton do a excellent job (the reason for a 5 & not a 3) in this movie (even though Tilda Swinton is little used) doesn't mean that its great. The cinematography is good (though a bit washed out, but that could be on purpose based on the total lack of tension in this movie, so why have anything but pastel hues?); the direction I found to very good (even though Joanna Hogg, working from her own script) loves wide framing that seems to collapse on close encounters. The script though is just a lot of talking, talking, talking that seems to be leading us nowhere. Scene after scene of conversation that is all very nice but has little purpose. The only person who has anything interesting or useful is Anthony (Tom Burke). Julie (Honor Swinton Burke) seems to be so unaware that it gets very tedious watching her sleepwalk through this mess. (I have yet to understand the title "The Souvenir" as it relates to the story. I give guesses but the might be spoilers) This movie is like being with friends & having a nice evening (The reviews &Trailers for this movie) and then just as you open the second bottle of wine they stand up and say now let's go to the den so we can show you the slides of our vacation to the Kansas & Nebraska Prairie! (The movie starts!) (No offense to the great states of Kansas & Nebraska, but you are flat!). This movie builds no tension between its characters, it does nothing but shows a day in the life of a slick, maneuvering man & a woman who has no sense of the world around her & is a prime enabler. Is it about her blind love for him. Is it about his manipulation of her. Is it about her lack of knowledge of...of...well basically everything. I kept hoping this movie would do something, would go somewhere, would show us something that we could care about (especially regarding Julie) but it never did, it just kept wandering and wandering to the expected conclusion with a closing shot (reminiscent of the final shot on The Searchers, although I am sure it was not on purpose). As you read all the glowing reviews about the acting, etc. I would say 2 things - 1. All that great acting, cinematography, even directing doesn't mean squat without a script that means something and 2. They said that the English Patient was a great movie too!