Momento de Afeto

This film was not at all what I expected. There are four seemingly unrelated storylines all going on at once. I could have seen more of Emma Thompson and Phyllida Law (Thompson's mother both on and off screen -- terrific performance!), but that's a small quibble. This is one of those movies where you're not sure if you like it or not, but days later, when you're STILL thinking about it, you figure that there must have been SOMETHING to it after all...

The Winter Guest (1997)

This has the depth and studious pace and multi-pronged construction of a good play. Which it once was. And like many plays turned to cinema, this carries along some first rate dramatic acting, namely by Emma Thompson and her real life mother, Phyllida Law, playing mother and daughter. As a small twist, the playwright, Sharman Macdonald, is mother to someone else we know, actress Keira Knightley.

The scene is a forlorn village in the dead of winter on a Scottish coast. We are shown the first turn of innocent love, a pair of boys playing with the edges of right and wrong, a pair of old woman touching on what death looks like if not felt, and the mother daughter pair who deal with a little of everything. Including photography, which serves as a classic artist's release, a way to take you out of your head and into what is out there in front of you.

Don't expect action, or even any great surprising turn of events. At first I went along with the slow, beautiful pace thinking it was all building to something. And I suppose it was, after all, but nothing that will shock you. It's better than that, and more real, and more touching. The movie and play are both quite good, lacking the finesse and originality of the most amazing works around us, drawing even from Ibsen or Chekhov in the realism and power of very ordinary people in faraway places. The acting is tremendous within the cool dry restraints of the plot, and in fact might make more the the play than is there. If you like a bit of reality without sensation, but just tenderness and meaning, this will work.

A beautiful ordinary story. A film made of long silences and unheard incessant talk. Of painful memories and hopeful looks. Of attending funerals as social occasions. Of unexpressible love. Of a beautifully photographed gray Scottish landscape.

Emma Thomson and Phyllida Law deliver powerful performances, although the incredibly poetic early teen Sam and Tom almost steal the movie.

When you are tired of idiotic movies that look all the same, go see or rent this one. Highly recommended.

Alan Rickman has made a breathtakingly beautiful, haunting movie that sucks you in and won't let you go until long after the credits have finished rolling. The story centers on four couples: a mother and her grieving adult daughter, her son and the girl who takes a fancy to him, two young teenage boys going through all the troubles of puberty, and two old ladies with nothing left to do but attend funerals. Their stories are intervowen, against the backdrop of a gorgeous Scottish winter landscape, which is threatening to take over and swallow them whole. They all have to find their paths in life, realize what's important and what's worth living for.

The pace of this movie is very slow, so granted, it's not for everyone. But if you like your movies bittersweet, with reality seeping out of every pore, then this is a film for you.

This film is one of those small but delicious productions in modern european film industry that makes it worth to continue going to the cinema. It is the film version of a Scottish theatre production, that did run with the same basic cast.

There is no main plot. It is the summing up of four basic stories which are somewhat interwoven, describing the relationships between very different human beings.

The Scottish winter, framing all the story, is almost a character of its own. You can almost sense the ice, the intense coldness around the characters, but you altogether feel the warmth of human emotions.

The actors are all outstanding in their characters. Above all others, Phyllida Law and Emma Thompson (real life mother and daughter) give a very powerful performance, portraying a depressed recent widow and her energetic and controlling mother: really a charming old lady.

The great Alan Rickman's direction is in my opinion a very good job, bringing all the different stories together and making a magnificent choral film.

I eagerly look forward to his next attempt in directorial tasks.