Kinetta

"Kinetta" is a Drama movie in which we watch a group of strangers, at a Greek hotel in the off-season trying to recreate some homicides and, film and photograph them.

I have to admit that I wasn't sure what to expect from this movie but after watching I need to say that I wasn't ready for this. The plot was weird, it didn't make any sense and the evolution of the movie was slow and boring. The direction which was made by Yorgos Lanthimos was something very different from his new movies. Regarding the interpretations of the cast I don't have much to say since there isn't anything worth saying. Finally, I have to say that "Kinetta" is a weird movie or maybe I didn't understand it.

at last, something new is going on Greek cinema. i was disappointed by reading the summary in Thessaloníki film festival. it is not a film that tells a history, thus it is not worth searching for academic forms just to try to fit in a category. i was excited that a Greek film can touch me without listening thousands words by the actors with the dictionary of hard meanings on my legs. the film is using, simply, the language of body, helping it with an excellent camera work and if you are not afraid of leaving yourself free, watching the minimum cinema "effects", you 'll get the sentiment. i saw three kind of people in the film, i saw different kind of people's loneliness and people's imposition of power. risky but very efficient the direction-editing throws to the recycle bin whatever isn't really essential. brilliant music replaces lost people's senses without been overused. imaging there was a lot of improvisation on shooting i am curious of how a choice was taken because the film is running consecutively and nothing seems kicked out. after all, it's a hope that some guys load some 16mm magazines don't wait the big production budgets and do some new cinema.

Yorgos Lanthimos' solo directorial debut is a 95 mins long exercise in boredom & nonsense that at first piques the curiosity with its perplexing premise but it doesn't take long for the interest to fizzle out. An experimental drama that deals with psychology & behaviour studies through three strangers who team up to recreate badly reenacted scenes of homicides, Kinetta is one hell of a slog.

Also co-written by Lanthimos (Dogtooth & Alps), the story should've sufficed as a short film, for it doesn't have enough material to deliver as a feature-length narrative. Lanthimos' lets the plot to drift & wander with no sense of direction and the dreary ambience & awful camerawork don't help the cause either. There are however signs of quirkiness that the director is today known for but it's not refined.

The dizzy handheld camerawork becomes a bother after a while and the characters being cold & distant don't offer any inlet into the story as well. Performances are barely serviceable, its 95 mins narrative is tediously paced and bland editing makes the whole thing a frustrating sit. The idiosyncrasy on display doesn't have much to hold on to, and just being able to sit through it all feels like an achievement.

Overall, Kinetta is a dull, lifeless & excruciatingly slow offering that unfolds like a story on stasis and suffers from poor direction, lazy writing & no idea about what it wants to be. An experiment by the filmmaker to carve out his own unique style by throwing around a few ideas & checking if any of it sticks, this Greek picture is neither properly executed nor thought through and is solely reserved for Lanthimos completists.

99% percent of 21st century Greek filmmakers would not be able to direct a good film even if their life depended on it. It's no coincidence that the crowning achievement of modern Greek cinema-Dogtooth-borrows its plot and visual style from other films. Left alone to his own devices, the best someone like Lanthimos can come up with is rubbish like Kineta and Alps.

Despite an impressive visual style, Kineta is one of the worst films ever made. No story, awful acting, terrible pace. What's even worse is that every Greek filmmaker is trying to imitate the Lanthimos style, hoping to get some exposure at a European film festival.

It's been a long established fact that none of these films get their money back. The only reason they keep on getting made is because of state funding. This is one more of the failures of European socialism. Funneling taxpayers money to support art of dubious quality. It wouldn't surprise me if the directors made the film with a fraction of the allocated budget, pocketing the best. There was once a time when commercial films made in Greece were able to fill the cinemas. Quite naturally those films were considered low level because they were made strictly for entertainment purposes. Unfortunately this system has been destroyed and replaced by organizations with a political agenda. This is a general problem that occurs all over the European Union. Just take a look at the type of films that are promoted in European festivals. Filmmakers hoping to become the next Lanthimos don't dare to experiment. It would be equal to suicide.

Bear in mind that there is no such thing as an European art film. None of the films getting the main prizes in European festivals are "art". They are just a product created by people who follow established guidelines. It doesn't matter if nobody goes to the theater to see it as long as funding for the next project has been secured. This is how the system works.

Well. I'm not sure why, but I love movies like these.

Not a plot going on, not a very known backstory, lots of experiments... Great.

I do love this director, but never heard about this one.

Decided to take a look and... well. I truly enjoyed It.

I never went to Greece so... maybe there's a lot of things that make sense only for the locals but, still, I loved the ambience, the rythm, the silence.

It touched me in a strange way.

I'm not sure If this is a movie to recommend, but give It a chance.

Maybe, who known, it's your kind of movie too?

And, for sure, it's a great introduction to Yorgos cinema.