Curling

This is a story about a not-so-interesting father and his daughter, who has been shielded from external influences for 12 years. It goes as far as not even having attended any school. The film opens with that remarkable conclusion by an optometrist, who is asking questions why she comes so late with her eye problems, because she should have had problems long before with the blackboard during classes. From that moment on, this peculiar situation (for us) enfolds step by step.

The situation in and around the house is portrayed in a number of short scenes, where indeed (as they say) pictures tell more than 1,000 words. I very much admire that part of this film. The same recipe is followed when showing where the father works, and the barely existing relationships with his colleagues. We are showed around in 50 minutes, while we all are wondering what is going to happen. A lot of extra tension is particularly created when the daughter finds a pile of dead bodies in the woods.

However, the story reaches a dead point after the first (promising) hour. I did not see it heading anywhere, and I see no moral nor a conclusion either. We see no real progress in the contacts with his colleagues. And neighbors are kept at a safe distance (at best) or chased away (often). And what may be the purpose of the father leaving his house and wandering around, without showing any concern how his daughter will cope alone in the house.

I wonder about all these open ends. Maybe I expected too much after having read the intriguing synopsis? I think that the given plot could be turned much more in our advantage. All the binding elements were there, only to be picked up and mixed in order to create a compelling film.

Denis Côté both wrote and directed this very strange yet intriguing film CURLING. The film is a thinking person's film, rather slow, in a minimalist approach to story and filming, yet the theme is universal and important - self-imposed isolation, fear and connection between people as exemplified by a bizarre father daughter relationship. Of note, the father and daughter of the film are in real life father and daughter. That adds. The title? Curling is a sport in which players slide stones on a sheet of ice towards a target area which is segmented into four concentric circles. So be ready to past together the fragments of the film that are at times disturbing and at times humorous.

Set on the fringe of society, in a remote part of the countryside, CURLING takes a keen look at the unusual private life of a father and his daughter. Between his unremarkable jobs, Jean- Francois Sauvageau (Emmanuel Bilodeau) devotes an awkward energy to Julyvonne (Philomène Bilodeau). The two are isolated, with the father blocking his daughter by projecting his inhibiting lack of life into her, keeping her safe by making her stay small. She doesn't go to school, doesn't have any friends, doesn't have much contact with the outside world and so she is naively dependent on her shy introverted father to provide her with nothing - no TV, no computer, no mobile phone, the occasional rationed out bit of music from the Hi-fi. The fragile balance of their relationship will be jeopardized by some very dreary circumstances: Julyvonne finds a pile of frozen bodies and seeks some sort of solace to keep going back to be with them; a little boy goes missing; a trucker checks out of a motel room and leaves blood splattered everywhere. No real resolution to any of these incidents - and that fits the film - Little fragments that dangle in the wind like weird wind chimes that make this examination of isolation in today's society refreshingly unique. In French with English subtitles.

A movie that feels like it's constantly on the cusp of pulling itself together, about an arm-length from greatness, but which never quite gets there. Still, I'm excited to see more from Denis Côté. Curling was worth it alone for the shot of the father and daughter walking through the blizzard, which I hope will haunt me forever.

The best thing about this film is the Jucifer song in the end credits. There is a strong idea here, but I suspect that it ended up overshadowed by an inexplicable desire to make "Curling" a collection of bizarre inconsistencies. Trying to explain better what I mean, when David Lynch fills us with bizarre situations, we feel an authenticity that justifies them, here I don't feel the same because the bizarre aspects exist in isolation without building something authentic. The desire to do something ... different is so strong that it overlaps the narrative. But not everything is bad, there is a subtle and intelligent mood that survives and that made me see the whole movie without suffering and pain.

I can't tell you that there is something that is rather terrible or not at all. I do know that the father and daughter are also actually in private life and within the film as well although I'm also not sure about the wife and daughter but it seems likely that she is but is in prison. We do not know why. The young girl doesn't go to school and it seems she doesn't have much education at all but we are not sure that the father had much either. The girl is on her own most of the day and sometimes goes out looking around as they live in a rather desperate, fringe of society within the remote part of rural Quebec and it is very snowy. The daughter finds a tiger in a cage in the snow and looks wonderful although her mother was annoyed and maybe she knew that it was just imaginary. And what about the bodies in the snow that she finds so interesting and then the blood trails he finds where he works at a motel and another body that he hides? It is a slow film but I enjoy it and I think that I will find out what is going on but it is not so although for some reason, it is still okay. Oh and there is a little curling we see although it may not always be real.