Wow! No explosions, yet still good.

Rating: 8/10 (15 April 2006)

According to my film 2 professor, this film is what is known as a character film. That means it shows the invisible, what is happening in the character's soul. OK, doesn't sound like my thing, but whatever, I was down for a free movie & getting out of a class or two. The movie starts with this little girl, focusing on her & her point of view, she gets in & out of a car, she sees the world as she rides in the car. As a side note, the audio wasn't working the 1st day, so the bass was very heavy. I think watching the movie this way, or at least the very beginning, helps to enhance to feeling the director chose to create of being underwater. Moving on. The camera focuses on a teenage boy sitting by the side of the road, & he watches the car drive by. He looks away. Off camera, we hear a crash. It was the car. Somehow, by not showing the actual crash, then showing the devastated car, the feeling the audience is able to experience is parrallel to that of any bystander: you hear a noise, expect it to be something mundane, and are filled with shock to realize that it is not. The rest of the movie focuses on the girl's mother, crushed to find that her husband & daughter died in the crash. At first she is self destructive, attempting suicide, having a loveless affair with an old friend, and dragging her knuckles along a stone wall until they tear & bleed. Later, she moves into an apartment, befriends her prostitute neighbor, and goes swimming. Her life is more in her control. Sadly, she finds that her husband had an affair, and the woman is now pregnant. She decided to give her husband's son their old house, and the movie ends with a sequence of everyone, showing how unhappy their lives are. The color blue appears throughout the movie, especially in a glass chandaleir whose importance is left to the viewers imagination.