On Falling

"Aurora" (Joana Santos) has left the warmth of Portugal and moved to a rather dreich Scotland where she works as a picker in an warehouse. The job is the epitome of mundanity and repetitiveness - walking the aisles scanning items bought online and making sure she does it quickly enough to earn her paltry reward at the end of the week. It couldn't quite be called "slavery", but it's not a kick in the shirt off it as she and her colleagues collect the minimum wage for their work. She lives in a flat-share where the daily routine extends to microwave meals and the occasional chat with her flatmates. One new lad, "Kris" (Piotr Sikora) arrives and seems a little more inclined to break the monotony of things, but she accidentally drops her phone and the £99 it costs to have the screen repaired pretty much wipes her out for the month and reduces her to a starvation diet. Perhaps there are hopes of a new job? At any rate, she has to break this depressing cycle before it breaks her! This film doesn't miss and hit the wall when it presents us with the automation of human life. "Aurora" lives a life of a robot, and the brain-rot that it induces is plain to see, but sadly it also indices a bit of ennui in the viewer too. It's very authenticity is what makes it dull to watch and none of the characterisations are remotely developed enough to make anyone care about her. Sure, the environment is a shocking indictment of the consumer culture that is best exemplified here by a team brief in which they celebrate the corporate glory by giving the staff a cup cake, but once that point has been made and absorbed, the rest of this is just as unchanging as the message. Why is she here? Why doesn't she return home? Her emotional and physical isolation seems contrived for dramatic purposes rather than being particularly plausible. The acting is competent enough and there isn't so much dialogue to trouble us so maybe that's why I found it all just a bit too one-dimensional.

I watched On Falling today. It's a pretty great movie. I saw a lot of people talk about the fact that the movie didn't give any details or depth about aurora's character but thats on purpose. The movie wants to show that we live in a society drained by capitalism where people take care of their professional life more than their social life. It surely makes you think about how some people just drain themselves mentally (and physically) for that minimum wage that makes them pay just for rent and food. Everyone should watch it.

Was not ready for such a slow movie. It was really slow going. And depressing here and there. Not all the time, cause Aurora seems to be fine most of the time. But she can't possibly be, can she? This is no kind of life. Although it's the life of many, but it's no way to live. And I'll never be able to understand why you would leave Portugal for Scotland to do this kind of job where you are barely surviving on the money you make from week to week. Like I am sure she could have done the same exact job at home, but at least she would've been around her people, in her own home, in the sun. That makes no sense to me. And of course it's never addressed. We don't know anything about Aurora, why she is living like this, for what, how she came to be this way. She is smart, poised, presentable, well spoken, relatively attractive. What could derail her life so much?

Also, stop online shopping so much people. If not for the sake of these poor pickers then at least to reduce the carbon footprint. Walking to the shops is good for you too. Shops employ people too.

Saw this at IFFR 2025, the International Film Festival Rotterdam. This movie can easily be considered an indictment against the sort of slavery we (you and I, the warehouse customers) bring about to obtain the stuff we want delivered on our doorstep. It is not slavery in the literal sense, since they get minimum wage and are not mistreated in any way, but it is a daunting sight anyway to see how their daily grind works.

And alas, their life outside the warehouse is not much better. Compact housing, and nothing much to do outside work hours. Making friends beyond the obligatory Hello and Where Are You From in passing, is virtually impossible, neither at work nor at "home".

All the people we meet on screen are passersby, and we don't know much about them. Even Aurora, the center of the story, is a black box for us, and remains that until the finale. No opportunity for us to invest in the characters, if only to feel along with their work circumstances, and neither are we involved in their life at home or their leisure activities or even their reasons for being there.

All in all, we are flies on the wall, at work as well as at home. We should feel guilty because of causing all this "slavery", but we don't. We could pity their way of living, but we don't. We should want to know how these people arrived there and what (other) plans they have with their lives, but the movie doesn't tell us anything. A missed opportunity, or done on purpose??

A touching, thoughtful and beautiful film about life, survival and the importance of little moments to the human spirit.

The park scene is both beautiful and deeply saddening.

In a world that has become more and more devisive and isolating, this film acts as a reminder to all of us to look after each other out there!