Grand tour

A poem movie, reflexive about human condition, the human trivia that humans try to make as a huge and it's nothing. We humans make things important when nothing is important than our souls, the comfort for the spirit. The movie invites us to reflect about what is important to us. The different journeys through Grand Tour show the importance for us to keep faithful to ourselves. Why do we need the wealth positions? Why do we need to keep doing what is unpleasure? Does it worth while to die for what we believe? Maybe yes or maybe it doesn't matter the end but the moment only by itself and what we get at each time; future is only a ghost which decorates our minds towards the momentum.

Hailed in Cannes for innovative direction, I cannot agree. "Grand Tour" comes as an arty project which would have been better as a travelogue. Alas, the filmmaker wanted to give us a story and lifted an idea from the short story "Mabel" by W. Somerset Maugham, though he forgot to tell tell us about it. The short story is only 5 pages long, which is why the "story" is told to us in a way that feels like a joke told by a person with a speaking disorder. You already know what comes next but out of politeness you have to wait. This is deadly boring and some people fled the movie after the first half an hour and I wish I had followed their example. In between the narrative which is set to be in 1917 and filmed in b/w, we get a lot of contemporary stuff in color. Yes, the camera work is brilliant and the editing too, therefore I give it a four instead of a two.

And I don't mean the story alright? The artistic choices are downright baffling in a way that made me continuously ask myself "why". Why go through all this trouble to tell this story? Why this story? Why the odd language solutions? Why the anachronism? Is this about colonialism? I ought to be about colonialism because these people are terrible right?

I try to relax and enjoy the cinematic experience but experience what? The photo is good, the costumes are nice, the parts from modern day east Asia could have worked in a documentary. It's soup and meatloaf and dessert mixed as one dish. I would have liked it more if it was just abstract. Now I'm just annoyed, provoked and thinking whether I'm thinking too much or not thinking enough. At least the story will lead somewhere, right? Whelp, never mind.

A film about a couple from 1918 as they trail each other within the Indochina after a failed rendezvous inter-sped with the current world. Narrated in the language of their setting.

Another uneven film. I personally do not think that the 'experimentation' worked. It does not compliment the other elements of the film on any level AND it was just a weird distraction. The pseudo-documentary travelogue lacks a connecting tissue to be honest.

I am also quite mixed about the story overall.

It made more sense as the film went on, especially after getting the second main character takes over BUT the initial story could have been more knowingly hinting of the 2nd half of the film. Its far too concerned in creating the mystery that it loses so much power on its own. Its just sometimes feels so fleeting.

The second half is where the strength of the film really relies. The performance can be distracting (the constant annoying blowing raspberries was so bad) but it is where it made sense and has life. Molly has a sense of meaning AND actual flow that puts a focus in this film. You actually feel that this tour is going somewhere AND maybe not quite well. The initial silliness is suddenly filled with the conscious melancholy. Molly is desperate because she truly is doomed.

Soft recommendation.

Portuguese filmmaker Miguel Gomes' (TABU) latest cinefile creation was a Cannes Winner for Direction and that country's official Oscar submission.

It's a heady combination of travelogue and dual personal journeys. We are told by narration that in 1918 Edward (Goncalo Waddington) escapes from his fiancee Molly (Crista Alfiate) and embarks on a 'Grand Tour' of Asia (Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, The Philippines, Japan and China). The location footage is clearly of the present day, which emphasizes the transitory nature of time and experience. There are separate narrators for each of the five countries. The audience doesn't see Molly until past the halfway point in the film as she traces Edward's travel paths.

It's a visually dense production, shot on 16mm and primarily in Black & White. The story is spare and largely secondary to the sensory experience. Waddington's Edward is quiet and taciturn. Alfiate is quite the opposite, vivacious with a distinctive laugh/chorttle.

Gomes' film isn't out for any grand statements, but if one can give themselves over to his leisurely vision, it's one to savour.