The Other Side of November

Fundamental stake about our memory, our past and all the things that life, fate or choices drive us to do and decisions to take... This movie wakes so many existential questions. I've watched it with all my senses and it did turn things in my head... Actually, after the presentation (at the festival du cinema nouveau) everybody was pondering... I would have loved to hear the director talk about it... I do recommend it.

All actors are very convincing and the youngest are touching. The differences between Canada and Lebanon are very interesting on all levels. The music is gorgeous and the photography very artistic. What I loved most is the journey through the memory of a person with Alzheimer who doesn't own all her memories anymore. I think she is trying to reach the turning point of her life, the very moment where everything changed forever. I thought this movie is profound and sad. While movies from this part of the world are usually about politics and social life, this film made me travel beyond everyday News and for me it was a very enjoyable cinematic experience. If you have a chance to watch it, don't miss the joy of an inner journey...

I watched it in Athens during a Canadian film festival organized by the Greek film archives. It was a bad film. To begin with, I think that the scenario was very weak. I found the timing of the shots wrong. The pieces of the puzzle were presented in a way which did not allow you to make sense of what the film maker wanted to say. Although it did have the ingredients of a melodrama it ended up as an abstract description of people with mysterious lives. I must admit that the quality of the pictures was not bad and the locations were picturesque. The trouble, to my mind, is that they did not correspond to the surroundings one would expect for the protagonists to move in. I think that especially the Jordanian environment was too glamorous, something which is rarely encountered. I would have thought that focusing on just the heroin and trying to describe the development of her alternative lives after her crucial decision to emigrate or not, would have produced a better cinematographic result. By placing too much emphasis on the relationship with her friend, I think that the film maker misses the point of describing the divergent life paths resulted from the decision.

Beautiful movie. The best thing about the movie i loved is that the journey through our mind and fundamental stake about our memory, our past and all the things that life, fate or choices drive us to do and decision to take... I loved all the actors in the movie and their acting. The director presented the differences between Canada and Lebanon. I loved the music . I loved the photography of the movie. It was enjoyable cinematic movie.

The director is a young woman who is herself of Lebanese descent and it makes the narrative more significant. She introduced her film as the story of a woman with 2 parallel lives: the one who chose many years ago to immigrate to Quebec and the one who chose to stay in Lebanon. It is a very touching story with multiple layers and the scenery, the costumes as well as the music are terrific. I enjoyed it and hopefully, I'll get to see her future films.