Being Flynn [2012]

MPAA (R)  Roger Ebert (3 Stars) Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455323/
Roger Ebert's review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120307/REVIEWS/120309983

Being Flynn (screenplay written and directed by Paul Weitz based on the book entitled Another Bullshit Night in Suck City: A Memoir by Nick Flynn) is probably one of the better serious movies to be released in this "off season" immediately following this year's Oscars.

The film's about a very difficult father-son relationship.  Jonathan Flynn (played by Robert De Niro) is an aging father, who's spent most of his adult life in prison (as a petty and apparently not particularly good con-artist, forging checks, etc).  However as is often the case despite the massive evidence to the contrary, he's convinced that he's actually a great man, in his case a great writer just about to be discovered.  Indeed, the film begins with Jonathan Flynn introducing himself to the audience declaring in voice-over that "there have been only three truly great American writers Mark Twain, J.D. Salinger and myself, Jonathan Flynn."  As he waxes eloquent about his importance, he enters the parking garage, punches-in, gets into his taxi and begins his shift ...

A second voice-over then begins, that of his son, Nick Flynn (played by Paul Dano) who concurs that this story is indeed about his father Jonathan Flynn, except that Jonathan isn't really the one telling it, Nick is.  Nick then proceeds to re-introduce his father as having been largely absent from his life -- because Jonathan had been in prison during most of Nick's childhood.

We then see a flashback with Nick as a child (played by Liam Broggy) reading a letter from his dad already talking about how great a writer he is and that Nick, being his son, would probably inherit some of that gift.  For a few moments impressed, his mother Jody Flynn (played by Julianne Moore) quickly sets him straight.  "You know where that letter came from?  Prison!  Great writer?  Ha! He's in prison for writing forged checks."

Most of Nick's childhood is marked then by repeated disappointments at the hands of both of his parents, and finally himself.  In his later teens, Nick's mother killed herself.  As if often the case in situations such as these, Nick can not but partly blame himself.  Therefore, it's not entirely surprising that when we meet Nick he's something of a listless loser in his 20s, unemployed and kicked out of his girlfriend's apartment after she finds that he's been using the place to sleep with random women while she was at work.

Nick crashes in a dive with two similarly troubled roommates who take him because, well, they need someone else to split the rent with.  Through these room-mates however he somewhat randomly meets Denise (played by Olivia Thirlby) a friend of theirs who works at the nearby Harbor Light Inn, a large homeless shelter.  With no other ready prospects, he decides to go there to see if he could get a job as well.  The shelter's manager, Carlos (played by Eddie Rouse) who had story of his own was initially unimpressed with Nick's explanation of why he'd want to work with the homeless (basically he didn't have one) but decides to hire him anyway.

In the meantime, Jonathan's life, unravels as well.  Yes, when we had met him, he was gainfully employed -- as a taxi driver.  This had allowed him to afford a place to live -- an apartment in a somewhat seedy part of town -- but at least it was a roof over his head.  Remember however that Jonathan had some delusions of grandeur.  He's supposed to be a great writer.  So he gets upset "at the noise" made by some of the other tenants in his building.  As a result, when he inevitably overreacts one time, he gets evicted from his apartment.  That's when he makes his first contact _in years_ with Nick asking him to help him move his stuff "into storage" while he finds a more permanent place to live.  Nick, surprised, helps.  But of course Jonathan's slide is just starting.  A few weeks later, he's lost his taxi job and sometime after that he ends up at the homeless shelter where Nick is working.  Much ensues ...

It's not an easy time for either of the two.  Yet in the haze of more or less obvious borderline mental illness on the part of the father (again he continues to maintain that he's a great writer just about to become famous), he does actually help the son: The son eventually shares with him the circumstances of his mother's (Jonathan's estranged wife's) death.  And in _one moment_ of lucidness, the father tells the son: "I may have made you (a favorite saying of his throughout the movie).  You're mother may have made you.  But we are not you.  So I absolve you (of _our_ sins)."  And it is enough, the son's life changes... as actually does the father's.

Great movie.

One complaint.  There is one very random anti-Christian line of dialogue in the movie that certainly stuck with me until now.  Describing the people working in the homeless shelter, Nick rattles through stereotypical dismissals of everyone there.  Regarding "the religious types" he gives an example of a young woman there who (in exaggerated fashion) declares to the audience: "I'm here because I want to act as Jesus did" then continuing under her breath "and also because I hate my rich parents."

To be fair, Nick dismisses the motivations of just about everybody else as well.  And arguably this dismissal of the motivations of everybody else working in the shelter was symptomatic of Nick's own issues at the time when he began working there.  As much as he would have hated to admit it, he was all too much "like his dad" ... who was also more or less obviously dismissive of the people around him (he was a "genius writer" afterall...).

Still, I didn't like the anti-Christian dismal because my own experience has been that it's not true (or perhaps stops being true).  I also did the helping at the homeless shelter "thing" (if one wanted to call it that) in my 20s. Further I too had a mother who died early (of cancer) and I too was angry at the time at my dad who (even to his surprise) "came into some money" some time afterwards.  Still, I'm 20-years over all that (long since made peace with my dad) and for the last 10 years, I have been taking my parish's Confirmation and high school kids to a soup kitchen here on a regular (4x a year, whenever there's a 5th Sunday) basis and both the teens and the parents love going.   We also go and (try to) sing twice a year at a nursing home (around Halloween and Christmas).  We decorate cookies for a hospice around Christmas time.  And we've written both our troops and on behalf of political prisoners abroad.  Finally, in recent years, we've blessed animals on St. Francis' Feast Day and even done a few gardening days around the Church with the teens.  And everybody gets it.  This is what Jesus would want us to do. 

So perhaps a part of my early motivation in my "concern for the weak" would have been some anger and pain.  But that pain and anger had long since dissipated.  And what's left is a lot of young people having a chance to have some good memories as they grow-up of helping "the least among us" (Mt 25:40).

So I didn't particularly like the comment made in the film about the Christian worker there at the homeless shelter, though I do understand that the character dissing her (and the others) at the time was in a very bad place himself.  We can say stupid things when we are down ...

Still, Nick grew (though we never know if he changed his opinions of the people who worked around him as he himself).  And in any case so can we ...

Avé [2011]

Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1833647/

Avé (directed and cowritten by Konstantin Bojanov along with Arnold Barkus) is a sad if compelling young adult "road movie" from Bulgaria that I recently saw at the 15th Annual European Union Film Festival held at the Gene Sickel Film Center in Chicago, IL.

The film is about two young hitch-hikers, a late-teen early 20-something young woman named Avé (played by Angela Nedialkova) and young university student, male, named Kamen (played by Ovanes Torosian).

Avé appears to have been from a fairly rich family.  Her father had been a diplomat and she and her brother had spent part of their childhood in India while her father had been stationed at the Bulgarian embassy in Dehli.  As a result, Avé knows some English.  Kamen appears to have lived all his life in Bulgaria though he did have some education as well being an art student in Bulgaria's capital city of Sofia.

They both find themselves hitchhiking for their own tragic reasons.  Avé is searching for her drug addicted brother, figuring that she'd be more likely to find him by chatting up people she meets at road-side cafes, diners, truck-stops and so forth.  It's clear that she's done this before.  Kamen, on the other hand, is trying to get to the village of his best friend in time for his best friend's funeral.  What happened to his best friend?  He committed suicide.  Why?  Because he had caught Kamen sleeping with his best friend's girlfriend.  So he's going back to his best friend's village in part to atone and in part to say, if he finds the courage, that he's sorry.

Bulgaria is a rather poor country.  As filmed in this movie, I could not help but find it to look something like the "New Jersey of Europe," not particularly picturesque.  A good part of the two's journey involved both crossing and traveling along the rather industrialized Danube River.  It becomes also clear in the film that Bulgaria is dominated by two major cities at opposite ends of the country -- Sofia its capital at the far western interior side of the country and Varna its principal port on the Black Sea.  (New Jersey is also dominated by two major metropolitan areas at opposite ends of the state -- New York City just to the north and east of the state and Philadelphia, PA just to south and west of the state).  Then just like New Jersey, with its Jersey Shore, Bulgaria has been famous over the years and in different times for its beaches on the Black Sea.  Indeed, during the Cold War when citizens of the various countries of the Soviet-aligned Warsaw Pact/Eastern Bloc could not travel outside of the Warsaw Pact, Bulgaria's Black Sea Coast was one of the Eastern Bloc's most popular tourist destinations.  Pretty much all of my Czech relatives spent one or two summer vacations on the Black Sea, in both Romania and Bulgaria.

Most of the film appears to be filmed in the countryside and small towns between Sofia and Varna.  It's winter or fall.  So it's rather cold, dank and grey.  When the two arrive at the village of Kamen's best friend it is simply raining and it doesn't really stop until they leave.  And of course the mother, religious (Bulgarian Orthodox), is devastated and dressed from head to toe in black.  The rest of the relatives only join her in her weeping, and worry about their Viki's (Viktor's) soul.  "It's a great sin to kill oneself," they keep muttering in their tears, trying to comprehend why.  Eventually Kamen, perhaps from the city and remember he came in part in hopes of somehow apologizing, perhaps because he can't stand listening to them anymore or perhaps trying to help them understand asks: "But what's so heroic about living if all life's about just going from 'point a' to 'point b'?

Remember this is a film about two hitchhikers more or less randomly traveling a grey desolate countryside seeking in part to atone for losing one soul, and searching for another.

No, Avé, this is not exactly a cheerful movie (though the character Avé does give it charm because as she talks up people for information about the possible whereabouts of her brother, she also enjoys embellishing her story in ways that makes her randomly going "from point a to point b" interesting).  But above all, the movie comes across as very sincere.   Bulgaria in the winter must be very grey.

Still all the major people associated with this film -- the writer, director, cinematographer and both main actors -- deserve recognition and praise for this film.  They told a very sad story, but told it very, very well, in a manner that all viewers could understand.


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Friends with Kids [2012]

MPAA (R) CNS/USCCB (A-III) Roger Ebert (2 1/2 Stars) Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1720616/
CNS/USCCB review -
Roger Ebert's review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120307/REVIEWS/120309981

Friends with Kids (written, directed and costarring Jennifer Westfeldt) is a romcom that's going to rattle and at least initially outright offend a fair number of people.  Two still-single attractive young professionals, Jason Fryman (played by Adam Scott) and Julie Keller (played by Jennifer Westfeldt), "living the dream" in Manhattan, New York, watch aghast as their married best friends Leslie and Alex (played by Maya Rudolph and Chris O'Dowd) and Ben and Missy (played by Jon Hamm and Kristen Wigg) "change" (become more stressed, arguably meaner) as they begin having families.  They also note (whether true or not) that people often remarry better after their first marriage falls apart (according to them, largely on account of those kids necessarily changing the relationship existing in the first marriage).

The solution that the two talkative and iconoclastic single friends come-up with is to have the kid outside of wedlock with someone that they kinda care about but not enough to marry (hence start "already divorced") and then just look for the "post-first marriage soul mate" who (according to their theory) seems to materialize out of the ashes of the first marriage (destroyed by having kids).  And the two decide, of course, that their current relationship (best friends but not attracted to each other) fits the bill.  What could go wrong?  Right?

Here we can thank Jennifer Westfeld for making the movie, definitely NOT to serve as an "example" of how things ought to be done in the world today.  Rather we should thank her because the film serves as a thought experiment and a discussion piece for all of us watching it.  Indeed, the other characters in the story, including the parents of the two adventurous, again iconoclastic young adults, are given opportunity to voice various objections to the scheme, objections that Westfield does not disparage in her piece. Indeed, if anything, I do think that she encourages the characters in her story (and the audience) to respond to the unorthodox, even shocking undertaking of the two lead characters of the story.

And as the film plays out, she does present some of the flaws in the scheme -- how does one come to explain this unorthodox arrangement to the kid (at 2 at 5 at 8 at 12 at 15 at 17 at 19 at 22 at 28 at really age)?  And then what is the true nature of romance?  Is it only to be found simply in beauty / roses / fine things and sexual acrobatics?  Or can it be found even in the changing of a diaper of a kid experiencing "projectile diarrhea?"

So as has often happened to me in the past by the time I get to the end of my review of the film, I find myself liking the film far more than when I started.

Folks, please don't take the scheme of the two lead characters in this film to be "the way things ought to be."  Rather understand the film to be intended to be a "discussion piece."  I've written here many times in this blog that ultimately Hollywood is far more traditional / conservative than one may initially believe.  Hollywood may flirt with radical ideas but often to return to and validate that which we understand as "tried and true" by the time the closing credits role. 

I do believe this film to fit in this mold.  It's a heck of a ride.  The two characters of this film bravely step out of the mold to try something new (and remember there's safety in this being "only a film", a "thought experiment," a "day dream").  Yet by the end, after ample "free discussion" by "the peanut gallery" (composed of the other characters in the story, and even we, the viewers) of the couple's avant guard choice, I do believe that the vast majority of us will leave appreciating "the wisdom of the old way."

Great film!

One last note to parents.  It should be obvious from the discussion above that even a teen won't "get' this film.  There is some bad language but no nudity.  Yet this film definitely deserves the R rating.  It's simply meant for adults, college aged or even post-college-aged and above.


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Silent House [2011]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  Roger Ebert (2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (2 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1767382/
CNS/USCCB Review - 
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/12mv031.htm
Roger Ebert's Review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120307/REVIEWS/120309982

Silent House (directed by Chris Kentis and Laura Lau who also wrote the screenplay for this film as a remake of Gustavo Hernandez' Uruguayan film La Casa Muda [2010]) is a film has several things going for it that in other circumstances I could find myself seeing.  The things going for it include: (1) that it is based on a relatively obscure foreign film that Hollywood deemed good / intriguing enough to remake, (2) it stars Elizabeth Olsen with whom I was very impressed in Martha Marcy May Marlene last year and (3) claims to have been shot "in a single take" (88 minutes in all) which would be "one heck of a take."

However, there's been a glut of "haunted house" movies of late -- Don't be Afraid of the Dark, Dream House, The Woman in Black, to say nothing of Paranormal Activity 1, 2 and 3.  Consider then the young woman driven psycho thrillers like The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (starring Noomy Repace in the 2009 Swedish version and Rooney Mara in the 2011 American version), the recently released Gone (starring Amanda Seyfried) perhaps even Martha Marcy May Marlene (already mentioned above that Elizabeth Olsen herself starred in) and perhaps the reader could understand my exhaustion:

I would imagine that Silent House is probably pretty good.  Further, reading the CNS/USCCB's review of the film, I'm pretty much certain that there isn't any gratuitous attack on the Church or Christianity or even gratuitous display of nudity in it.  Parents, I'd take the CNS/USCCB's rating that it is A-III (for Adults) as being almost certainly appropriate.  Yet since there have been so many movies similar to it that have been made in recent years, I simply can't justify going even to a bargain matinee to actually see it.

Perhaps if I were an older teen or college student in a group that liked these kinds of movies (and didn't already see many of the other movies similar to it) I'd think about seeing this one.  But the film seems too similar to so many others that have already been made.  So for me, the well here is dry.  Though I imagine the film itself is probably pretty good (if one likes this sort of thing), I can't justify spending the money (even with a matinee discount) to go see it.


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Cousinhood (orig. Primos) [2011]

MPAA (unrated but probably would be rated R)  Fr. Dennis (2 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1592521/

Cousinhood (orig. Primos), written and directed by Daniel Sánchez Arévalo is a happy-go-lucky if certainly irreverent and definitely morally questionable (by both U.S. and U.S. Catholic standards) comedy from Spain that played recently at the 15th Annual European Union Film Festival held at the Gene Sickel Film Center in Chicago, IL.

Still even if irreverent/crude at times, the film is not without value to a American viewer (obviously the version I saw was subtitled) and many, especially the young who speak Spanish would find themselves rolling over laughing.  The film reminds me of a fair number of Italian similarly light romcoms that I saw when I was studying in Rome in the seminary in the 1990s.  Finally  Cousinhood's (orig. Primos) very _light_ humor appears to me typical of the Spanish young adult humor that I've encountered over the years both through relatives and the various Servites that I'm met from Spain.

For an American viewer to get an idea of the irreverent / morally questionable humor present in the film, I'd suggest thinking of Animal House [1978] which while also obviously morally questionable in its humor, I'd _also_ recommend to non-American young adults as a prime example of, indeed, emblematic of _white_ American youth culture humor.  Yes, it's irreverent, yes it's morally questionable, yes it's often stupid, but ... a film like this still can be really, really funny (especially if it's understood to be intended to be that way).

So what's Cousinhood (orig. Primos) about?  It's about three male cousins in their late-20s.  The movie begins with one of them, Diego (played by Quim Gutiérrez), teary eyed, in a tux clearly dressed for a wedding addressing apparently an assembled group of guests first thanking them for coming-out and then continuing to explain:  About a month ago, in preparation for the wedding, though having lived together for some time, he and his fiance decided that they abstain from sexual activity until the wedding night -- in mentioning this, his voice clearly increases in intensity even as he continues crying -- in hopes of having a "really _great_ wedding night."

Anyway, three weeks into this period of waiting, he just couldn't stand it.  But reaching out to caress her cheek, she turned away and started to cry.  Getting a hold of himself, retracting his hand and quickly apologizing: "I know, I know, I'll hold out too, I'll hold out too," he didn't realize initially that (of course) that was _not_ the reason why she was crying.  Instead, she told him that she's not sure that she loved him anymore and thought that they should just cancel the wedding.  "What could I do?  She was crying more than I was," he explains.  So both crying, they decided to cancel the wedding and that "she'd tell her guests and he tell mine."  He finishes his words adding: "Obviously, it didn't turn out the way I thought."  The camera draws back and we see that he's speaking inside a church, half of which is filled (the half with his guests) and half of which (his bride's half) is empty ... "Now please thank you for coming but you can go home now.  I need some time alone ..." and sits himself down, hands over his face, on the floor beside the altar.

The film resumes with the Church empty except for two others, his cousins (his "primos").  There's Julián (played by Raul Arévalo) who's kind of the leader of three, and José Miguel (played by Adrián Lastra) who had also been a strong formidable sort of a guy (with "balls of Spartacus..."). But he came back from "serving in Afghanistan" with a glass eye and nerves so shot that he's been reduced to a pill-popping basket case.

Trying to cheer up Diego, Julián asks Diego to think of any girl that he may a shot with to get him quite literally off of the floor and (as we would say in the United States) "back into the saddle" again...  The first woman that comes to Diego's mind is Martina with whom he had his first sexual experience ... way back when he was 17 back in the sea-side town that the three primos and their families used to go to in the summertime when they were growing up.

Okay, it was a real long shot.  But at least the very idea of Martina of "way long ago..." gets Diego on his feet again.  So the three jump into a car and head off to the town that they used to spend their summers growing up in hopes that they might still run into this young woman there.  Much ensues...

Among that which ensues is that, of course, they run into Martina (played by Irma Cuesta).  She's now a drop dead gorgeous single mom with an .. (is it 8 or 9 year old?) son named Dani (played by Marcos Ruiz).  He seems kinda big for 8...  When they run into her, she's amiable, feels kinda sorry for Diego and his breakup, but makes it clear that she's quite happy being single raising her 8-9 year old son in peace.

One of the funniest (if very very stupid) scenes that I've probably ever seen on film follows as the three "primos" discuss their recollections of what Diego had told them "back then" about his first sexual experience with Martina 10 years ago.  Diego insists that he used a condom, "You know, the one that I had carried around that whole year in my wallet."  As they recall how he had gotten that condom, they remember that it had been made in a country that (fairly or unfairly...) immediately makes one wonder about its quality assurance practices...  "But you told me that there was a hole in it" says José Miguel." "No there wasn't."  "Or was it a tear? Yes, there was a tear because that's why you said that it fell off at one point."  "No it was fine, or yes, I 'fixed it'"  Finally, since he really had only that one condom ... he remembered that "used it a second time" (ick, even if  "creative" as only a clueless and horny 17 year-old would be "quick-thinking"/"creative" in a moment like that ...

All this becomes an absolutely hilarious exposition of all the things that could possibly go wrong when using a condom and becomes an entry way for someone like me to remind young folks why the Church (as a good mom...) tries to teach her children that one really shouldn't get involved with a person "in such a way" unless the two are both willing and able to accept the consequences of getting involved "in such a way." 

Anyway, Martina has this amiable if somewhat hypochondriac kid who's of a suspicious age ...

Various other things happen as well.  Diego's ex-fiance finds out where he is and comes, teary-eyed looking for him.

Julián in the meantime runs into an older man nicknamed Bacci (played by Antonio de la Torre) who used to run a video store in the town when the primos and their families used to come there.  The video business had since gone down hill and he became the village drunk.  On the other hand, his once precocious little daughter had grown-up (and is disappointed with her dad).  Some fixing needs to take place there as well...

All in all, the movie is very light, often rather crude and more or less obviously morally problematic but always with a twinkle in one's eye.  In the end of course everything gets resolved, and (of course) more or less satisfactorily.

Parents note that there is definite nudity in the film.  Remember that if nothing else, the film takes place in a Spanish (hence European ...) seaside resort during the summer.  So we see a lot more of Martina than the average American would initially expect (though Martina as I noted above, looks really, really fine...).  And it's all done then in a typically European or even typically post-Franco Spanish sort of way, with a mix of matter-of-factness and humor: "Hey, what ya lookin' at?   Haven't ya seen plenty of these before...?"

So I would probably tell folks to keep the young ones and even young teens away.  The film is more for young adults / 20-somethings anyway.  But then I do think that this film would be good for American adults and especially young adults to see because Primos (Cousinhood) would give an American adult a lighthearted if sometimes somewhat morally questionable window into a very different way of life and would definitely help an American appreciate why a European would be happy as pie to be European (and here specifically a Spaniard would be happy to be a Spaniard). There is a lightheartedness that pervades this film that is endearing.

ADDENDA:

I've found it often good in reviewing films like this to look-up what's being said of the film in the home country where it was produced.  So I would recommend to readers here to take a look at some of the external reviews of this film listed in the IMDb database noting that one can always run Spanish language webpages through translate.google.com to get at least a sense translation.

I also found an very good Spanish language movie review site Pantala90 operated by the media office of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Spain.  Alas, I could not find a review of this film Primos (Cousinhood) there.  However, a lot of the popular American films that I've reviewed on the blog are reviewed there as well and the reviews that I read were quite impressive.


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The Secret World of Arrietty (orig. Kari-gurashi no Arietti) [2010]

MPAA (G) CNS/USCCB (A-I) Michael Phillips (3 1/2 Stars) Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1568921/
CNS/USCCB review -
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/12mv021.htm
Michael Phillip's review -
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-02-16/entertainment/sc-mov-0214-secret-world-of-arrietty-20120216_1_studio-ghibli-animation-borrowing

The Secret World of Arrietty (orig. Kari-gurashi no Arietti) directed by Hiromasa Yonesbayahshi, screenplay by Hayao Miyazaki and Keiko Niwa) is a lovely children's animated film voiced here in English, made by the famed Japanese Studio Ghibly and distributed in the United States by Disney based on the first of the children's book series The Borrowers (Amazon [1] [2]) by Mary Norton. 

It's about a family of tiny people called "borrowers" -- 14 year old Arrietty (voiced by Brigit Medler [US version] and Saoirie Ronan [UK version]) and her parents Pod (voiced by Will Arnett [US version] and Mark Strong [UK verison]) and Homily (voiced by Amy Poehler [US version] and Olivia Colman [UK version]) -- who live under the floorboards of houses and are responsible for taking (err... "borrrowing") little items that we find/discover that we've "lost" or "misplaced" in our homes.

Ideally the items that these really tiny little people take are things that we wouldn't particularly miss anyway. So on one of the early adventures in the story, Pod and Arriety set out on an expedition to "bring home a sugar cube."  On the way, Arrietty finds a clothes pin, which becomes her "sword."  It's all really, really cute.

The life of these little borrowers is, however, fraught with danger.  Relatively small animals like cats, crows and even mice that we find around our domestic confines appear really big to them, and these animals have been known to eat the borrowers that they catch.  Further, people don't seem to differentiate much between "borrowers" and other "household pests."  So when they spot a borrower, more often than not, they call an exterminator to deal with their pest problem.

That then sets the stage for the story here.  A little Japanese boy named Sho (in the US version named Shawn, voiced by David Henrie [US version] and Tom Holland [UK version]) awaiting a major surgery is sent to rest in the countryside by his great-aunt (voiced by Gracie Poletti [US Version], Phyllida Law [UK version].  (In the original books, the Boy was English sent by his great-aunt into the English countryside to recuperate from Rheumatic Fever that he contracted while in India).  The house is where his mother had grown-up.  And when he arrives, he spots one of the "borrowers."

He's all excited because his mother had told him about them.  The borrowers are terrified, however, in particular mother Hillary, because being spotted by the humans generally means "bad things will happen to them," and actually "children are often worse than the adults." (Presumably human children would treat them as they would bugs and other small creatures, that is, bring out the spy/magnifying glasses, put them in jars, while forgetting to feed them, etc...).

Actually, Sho's quite nice.  But the caretaker of the house Karin in the Japanese/UK versions, Hara in the US version (voiced by Carol Burnett [US version] and Geraldine McEvan [UK version]) wants to call the exterminator.  So much ensues ... but Sho, himself lonely and facing suffering turns out to be a good protector/friend to the frightened little borrowers.

The drawing in this film is just beautiful.  The garden scenes in particular are beautifully captured as are the (seemingly) huge dew/rain drops that adorn the blades of grass and the flowers every morning.  It makes one want to cry.

And the story reminded me a lot of a Czech children's classic Broučci (Fireflies) about a family of fireflies that came out in England, in English translation during the war years, 1942, some years before Mary Norton's The Borrowers (1952) was first published.  There are clear differences in the story but there are also similarities (the greatest of which being the portrayal of the world from the perspective of a really, really small anthropomorphic being -- similar to the "sugar-cube" episode described above in Arrietti, the fireflies in Broučci would drink wine out of a grape ... ;-).

Anyway, it wouldn't bother me at all if Mary Norton could was influenced or partly inspired by that Czech children's story.  I just want to note that the other story was also very, very cute and that probably stories like this (about "little people") are going to tend to be very, very nice.


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The House (orig Dom / Dům) [2011]

Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1821406/

CSFD listing [CZ] [Eng-(Google)Trans]
CSFD reviews [CZ/SK][Eng-(Google)Trans]

The House (orig Dom [sk]/ Dům [cz]) written and directed by Zuzana Liová (CSFD listing Eng. translation unavailable), a young Slovak born director, is a joint Czech and Slovak production that recently played at the 15th Annual European Union Film Festival at the Gene Siskel Film Center in Chicago.

Set in a small Slovakian town in the mountains, it is a lovely current film about a clash of generational aspirations and expectations:

Inrich (played by Miroslav Krobot [IMDB] [CSFD]) is trying to be a good father by building a house for his daughter Eva (played by Judit Bardos [IMDB] [CSFD]) about to graduate from high school, the house of course being right next door to her parents' home ... ;-).

Eva, of course, has completely different plans.  She wants to go to London to work as an au pair (nanny) to see something of the world in this way, and, yes, implicit in this, perhaps score an English husband ...  A rather smart/talented teen, she's successfully put-up an online profile on an au-pair website and she's been saving-up money for the cost of getting to England by writing term-papers for her less ambitious classmates.

Part of the tragedy implicit in the story is that Eva is clearly a very smart young woman.  And what does she want to do with her life?  Go to College?  Clearly she's bright enough, and indeed, that's Inrich's Plan-B.  He's even saved up money to help her go to college, but will give her the money that he's saved up for her only if she does that.  Instead, Eva wants to go to England to work as a nanny for a couple of years and hopefully get married there.

So the two are at loggerheads.  What does ma', Viera (played by Tatjana Medvedská [IMDB] [CSFD] ) think of all this?  Well, clearly she's unhappy, sees a coming train wreck between her husband and her daughter and seems powerless to stop it.

Worst of all, she's seen all this before.  After Inrich had forbidden their older daughter Jana (played by Lucia Jašková [IMDB][CSFD]) from "going to Norway" after her graduation (Why Norway? Well, like the younger sis' Eva's dreams of England, Norway would be an attainable goal not all that far from Slovakia. And well, Norway's somewhere "other than Slovakia..." ;-), Jana got back at her father by marrying the amiable but rather loser of a son of a former "two bit" Communist party official that her dad hated.  By the film's start, Jana has three kids with said amiable "loser" and Inrich has no clue of how to reconcile with Jana, her husband (who he hates) and thus with his three grand-kids that he has through through them.

Being forced by her father to stay in town (or at least in/near Czecho-Slovakia), Eva starts "acting out" as well by entering into an illicit relationship with a man in his 30s, Jakub (played by Marián Mitaš [IMDB] [CSFD]), who turns out to be her English teacher her final semester at school. (Jakub had just returned from England to Slovakia because his Slovak wife "wanted a house..." when Eva first meets him.  What kind of a job can someone returning to rural Czecho-Slovakia get after having spent many years in England?  He becomes an English teacher at the local high school...).

A relationship such as this between a high school student and teacher is, of course, illegal / immoral in most parts of the world today.  So it ends badly.  As soon as the two are found out, Jakub is summarily fired by the school's Principal and Eva is barely allowed to graduate.

But what are Inrich and Viera going to do now?  Having already horribly botched their relationship with their older daughter Jana, now Eva's acting out and they're at the precipice again.  That's what the rest of the movie is about...

A few notes coming from someone like me, who is of Czech descent ;-), that may help the non-Czech or non-Slovak to appreciate the movie better:

(1) This is really a remarkable post Czechoslovakia, Czech and Slovak production.  It's clearly set in Slovakia.  The family in the film lives in a non-descript town in the Slovakian mountains. The currency used throughout the film is the Euro.  (Slovakia decided to go with the Euro a number of years ago, the Czechs perhaps with pretensions of "being like England" or even "becoming like Switzerland" have chosen to stay with the "Czech Crown."  This all makes for interesting conversation in both Czech and Slovak households in light of the current Euro crisis).   Still, while the movie was filmed in Slovakia, many of the actors are Czech and the film was apparently produced in both Czech and Slovak languages.  The version that I saw in Chicago was Czech.

(2) Since this movie was set in Slovakia, the Catholic Church does have a fairly significant presence in the film.  (Slovaks are some 90% Catholic, while the Czechs are about 60% Catholic and by reputation, especially in the cities, far less fervent...).  Eva is an organist at the local Catholic Church and when Eva's parents find out that she's had an affair with one of her teachers, they drag her to the priest where the irritated father (speaking perhaps for all irritated fathers everywhere) orders his daughter: "Tak spust se!" ('Okay now spill it ...!") to the dismay of the priest ... So much for the niceties of "private confession" apparently when one's teenage daughter is found acting badly ... Yet, we actually don't know what happens after Inrich orders his daughter to confess to the priest, and whatever would have been said, probably would have ended in private Confession.  Still we see an irate dad, demanding justice here from the Church against his daughter who's been misbehaving.

Would a scene like this play out in the (by reputation) "far more worldly" Czech Republic?  My guess is probably not in the cities.  But it is possible that in the countryside and in particular (at least by reputation) in rural Moravia (in the Eastern part of the Czech Republic, closest to, in fact, the border with Slovakia) the scene could well play out as well.

In any case, parents, whether practicing Catholics or secularists could probably relate to the scene and in the case of secular families, THEY MAY EVEN WISH THERE WAS A PRIEST OR PASTOR IN THEIR LIVES TO GO TO IN TIMES LIKE THESE.

(3) Americans may find the anger expressed between parents and children in the film (and even between the spouses) quite jarring.  I certainly found it jarring and I grew-up in a Czech home (if in the United States).  Perhaps to try to explain the rawness expressed (and not merely in the dialogue but also in the facial expressions) one could appeal to the basis of the conflict in the film:  Two sets of expectations, those of the father and of his two daughters, were utterly at odds.  The father was trying to be a good dad.  Yet he was utterly off-base with regard to what his daughters actually wanted.

As is typical perhaps of films in general (and actually of Czechs and Slovaks in particular), everything does get resolved in the end because no one really wanted to be so "right" as to irreversibly cause pain to the others (being Czech and having known and worked with Slovaks all my life, I do believe this to be a fundamental characteristic of both peoples -- these are two _small_ and fundamentally amiable peoples who don't want to be angry with another forever).  So it becomes inevitable that there would be a happy ending to this story.

Just how it all works out, I'm not going to say ... ;-)


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