On a hot Saturday evening –
toiling the day working, more of debating and discussing, when I stepped out of
office and sat on the cab, my only wish was to go and sit in a calm beach and
just stare at the sea – more of shoreline at night. Lack of will and energy
dragged me back to my cubby hole called home in Mumbai.
Being a list maniac, I opened the
list given in NY Times on Best movies to see in Amazon Prime and was shocked to
see that not a single movie was there (hence the bracket above is very
important) in the Indian movie list of Amazon Prime. Not to be defeated – I ran
through the movie catalogue and selected 15 odd movies for next 3 months.
After the movie got over and the
credits rolled – I realized that my wish of sitting by the coastline was no
longer a wish - it came true.
It’s a French movie directed by Robert Guediaguian and
starring Ariane Ascaride, Jean Pierre Darroussin, Anais Demoustier.
Set by a little bay near
Marsielle the story revolves around a beautiful house/villa built near the sea,
whose owner an old man get’s a stroke in the first scene and collapses to
become completely paralysed. While his eldest son who stays with him tends to
him, his other son and daughter come to visit him. The story starts here.
Beautifully shot – or maybe the
beaches and houses are so beautiful that anybody can shoot beautiful movies
there. It’s a place where time slows down – a small alcove built by few
families with their own hand when they came here many-many years ago and
continued to stay. Everybody knows each other, cares for each other. Its many
families staying together. So, the setting is calm, picturesque, boat’s
anchored in the alcove, small hilly terrain, and people going out to fish and
come back.
There are many ways you learn
philosophy / life lessons. Movie (and Story Books) is also one of them. The
movie is all about choices made by the 3 children and their father. It poetically
tells us – Let Go.
The daughter had not come back
for 20 years holding her Dad responsible for the death of her daughter (she had
drowned trying to reach out for her floating doll) and is angry/spiteful from
scene 1 but changes in next few days as she realises there is no reason of
holding on to something which happened so many years back – She was running
away from reality and she believed by closing the door to the past and opening
a new and exciting door (she became a famous actress and toured the world) will
shut out the past. As the movies unfolds, she confronts the reality and finds
love in various forms – a lover who is probably 40 years younger but adores her,
3 abandoned children and decides to stay back cancelling her tours.
Similarly, the other brother is a
communist in his heart and has been recently laid off and carries a bitter
taste in his head – angry at everything around. He believes he is a writer, but
his manuscripts have been rejected multiple no of times. He befriends a young
girl and in her he sees a respite / new beginning / hope – which helps him
forget the bitterness inside him. As he sees his father, staring at the sea, he
remembers the days of abandonment and merry making when he was a teenager and
realises that he should stop running and live with an illusion (girl). By the
end of the movie he asks her girl friend to go and decides to stay back and
help his brother run a small coffee shop. The girl in turn gives the manuscript
to the daughter asking her to read and understand her brother better.
The movies also go back very
briefly to show how free, happy, joyous they were - before all of them went
away. There is also a side story of 3 children who came into the island after
their boat capsized and how the family brings them in, start taking care of
them, giving them a new home – the family come together to make the children happy.
Which also awakens the child inside each of them and the feeling the brothers
and sisters shared when they were young.
I liked the movies for it’s slow
pace, beautiful location, sensitive portrayal by all the actors and most
critical was how it conveys the overall philosophy of the story in a very calm
and serene way. There is a beautiful flow in the movie from 1st
scene to the last.
(Written in July 2019)
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