October Film Review
by @saidonescottishlady
Originality, Oddity and Talking Sheep
There’s something rather lovely about a film that’s completely bonkers and knows it. This month, I’ve encountered a gloriously eccentric love story, a documentary that left me feeling rather more optimistic about the world, and a murder mystery featuring talking sheep. There’s something definitely bonkers about each of them.
The Incomer is a highly original, quirky love story about a council official sent to evict a brother and sister living on a remote Scottish island. Their father has been dead for years, and his warnings about incomers still govern their lives. The result is a pair of adults with arrested development, a worrying appetite for violence and a rather inventive relationship with reality.
What follows is a caper that’s sweet, soulful and gloriously peculiar. There’s a little touch of The Ballad of Wallis Island about it, which probably tells you everything you need to know about why I enjoyed it so much. It has its own distinctive world and is entirely comfortable inviting us in. Originality is all very well, but the trick is to make us care about the people inhabiting that world. The Incomer manages it.
Cycle of Love is a very different proposition, but another film that left me smiling. It tells the extraordinary true story of PK, a Dalit Indian artist who, in the 1970s, cycled all the way to Sweden to tell a woman he’d met in Delhi that he loved her. It’s such a sweet, naive and improbable tale that it is impossible not to be swept along by it.
I did have a reservation about the filmmaking. The journey is reconstructed with an actor visiting the places PK travelled through, interacting with people in the present day in a way that suggests they’re part of his past. I don’t think there was any intention to deceive, but the distinction between reconstruction and actuality wasn’t always clear. It’s a shame, because a little more signposting would have made the film stronger. At a time when truth and fiction are increasingly difficult to distinguish, filmmakers should take particular care about how they present the past.
That said, we all came out of the screening looking thoroughly buoyed. There’s something rather wonderful about sharing a genuinely uplifting story with an audience. It’s a reminder that cinema can still send you back out into the world feeling a little better about it.
And then there’s The Sheep Detective. Talking sheep, a murder mystery and a film that sits somewhere between Babeand Wallace & Gromit, without quite reaching the same epic heights. The direction is lovely, all sunshine and bucolic charm, and there’s clearly an audience for this sort of gentle, family-friendly caper. I suspect I’m simply not that audience. For a 60-year-old woman without grandchildren to entertain, it’s all a little too much talking sheep and not quite enough to hold my attention. I can admire the prettiness while wondering whether I might be better off having a nap.
Coat On or Kettle On?
Worth the trip, or worth the wait?
The Incomer: Either/Or. Just see it.
Cycle of Love: Coat on. It’s a lovely experience to share with others, and you may leave feeling brighter than when you arrived.
The Sheep Detective: Kettle on. Unless you have children to entertain — in which case, it might be just the ticket, take them to the cinema and enjoy a nap – worked for my granddad.
If you have any feedback on the column, please send to saidonescottishlady@me.com