Our Land (UK) (site)
The subject matter of Our Land is not something I had paid much attention to. There is a movement in the England called Right to Roam, and it concerns the rights, or lack thereof, in this country for people to basically walk anywhere in the countryside, with a focus on the massive country estates, the properties owned for generations by families whose ancestors paid for the land using the wealth generated by colonial acquisitions centuries prior. When the film began, this main argument I found a little weak - we have public footpaths, bridleways and rights of way criss-crossing the countryside; you can barely go five minutes down a road without seeing a public footpath sign - so why do we need to be able to tramp across bramble filled fields deep inside country estates risking being shot when we're 'mistaken' for a pheasant?
But the beauty of this film is that it has a slow, persuasive push towards a change of mind, or at least an openness to see the argument. A tiny fraction - 8% - of land is publicly accessible in England and Wales, and 1% of the population owns a staggering half of the land. This has been brewing for a thousand years or more, going back to William the Conqueror times, when the common land was carved up and attributed to the wealthier parts of society, giving us the patchwork quilt of walled property we have today. But why does property ownership mean a right to exclude people from that land? From experiencing the beauty and the calm, the nature and the restorative qualities therein that a single person owning many hectares has decided it is for his enjoyment alone?
I did not know for instance that in Scotland, the 2003 Land Reform Act among other things underlined the basic right for people to not be excluded from the land. This right goes hand in hand with the requirement that people do so responsibly - close gates, pick up litter, dogs on leads etc as you might expect, and Right to Roam has campaigned for the same in England and Wales.
Our Land provides both sides with the opportunity to make their points, and I found myself sympathising with aspects of both the right to roam movement, and the owners of the estates that commendably agreed to be part of the film. One in particular was almost comical in his caricature of an upper class twit looking down his nose at the prolls, coming onto his land and dropping litter, but even he was given the room to show a side for which I had some sympathy; indeed the landowners generally made a sensible enough point that some middle ground can be achieved. However you interpret the argument, Our Land leaves the camera on the subjects to make, or fail to make their point, and the audience is left largely to decide. If nothing else, it is a celebration of something this country still can be proud of - it's beauty. 8/10
Dragonfly (UK) (wiki)
Out on a lonely council estate somewhere in Yorkshire, widowed pensioner Elsie (played by Brenda Blethyn, gaining a BAFTA for her part) sits quietly as the nurses come and go to her bungalow. Next door, Colleen (a seriously chavved-up Andrea Riseborough) sits aimlessly watching the TV. Jobless and on benefits, her oversized dog brings her what little meaning her life has, as she scours the internet for images of a better life.
Spotting an in, Colleen sees an opening to get closer to Elsie, who is less than attached to the rolling carousel of faces that come to make her tea and give her a shower; Colleen, once only a noise next door becomes a much needed constant in Elsie's life, perhaps even a replacement for her distant son. But is Colleen purely there to lend a hand and be a good neighbour?
Dragonfly keeps things purposefully ambiguous, subverting the expectations we place on the character of Colleen and playing on the viewers' preconceptions of someone who 'looks like that'. Colleen is no angel for sure, but is her malevolent intention clear cut? The strength of the film is in this ambiguity which lasts in the mind long past the credits, leaving the viewer with questions of their own about how they see others. 8/10
The Thing With Feathers (UK) (wiki)
As we join Dad, an unnamed father to two young boys, he has returned from the cremation of his wife, who died suddenly and without warning. It quickly becomes clear that while he was an artist and author, she was the mother and took care of the house. Predictably, this results in a deterioration of the family routine.
But Dad also starts experiencing strange, malevolent things; crows crashing into the window, ominous messages on his phone. Someone out there does not take pity on him, and wants him to know.
This film had me pretty much from the start. Having two sons of my own made me realize what I have and how much could be lost in an instant; and as a study in grief, despair and eventual acceptance, The Thing With Feathers takes you on an emotional hollowing out and reconstruction with some of the best film-making I've seen in a long time. Benedict Cumberbatch (who plays Dad) should be on for some awards here, as he embodies the part of the troubled father struggling with the breakdown of his own mind, the viewer never quite sure where the reality ends and the hallucinations begin.
Hands down the best film of the festival so far. 8.5/10
One of Us (FR) (leedsfilm)
Lille, France is the location of an unassuming little building. Inside, a handful of volunteers from disparate backgrounds help with the asylum claims of LGBT people, fleeing persecution in any one of the many countries that still, explicitly or not, permit and even endorse the persecution and even execution of such people.
Gaining asylum isn't easy. First you need to apply to OFPRA (the Office for Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons), telling them via interview your experiences of persecution, the consequences you would face if you returned, and to prove to them, somehow, that your sexuality is what you claim it to be. Should they be unconvinced, a second chance appeal with the CNDA (National Court of Asylum) provides a lifeline. But all this is a challenge to someone who has just arrived often with minimal possessions and sometimes unable to speak French, which the application must be in. These volunteers help to coach the applicants to give them the best chance at passing these tests. As the film shows, they also provide a place of solace and safety, perhaps hitherto missing from their life.
Watching silently, this documentary follows several brave applicants who, after fleeing persecution and making it to France, agree to have their experiences laid out, not just for the OFPRA examiner, but for the film as well, many in the hope that they will help others by doing so. Not all are successful in their application.
In an ideal world, this sort of film should be accessible to show people on the fence about asylum seekers, or gay people, to watch, and see, and put a human face to the faceless numbers we see in the news. This film could do an awful lot of good if the right eyes saw it. 7.5/10
Dead Lover (CA/US) (wiki)
In a strange, dark nether-verse, a lonely gravedigger shovels the soil, and since she picks up the stink of every body she buries, she ain't so hot with the guys. That is until a poet with a bit of a kink for that sort of thing comes along, and they fall in love; one that is tragically cut short by his drowning at sea, leaving her with only a severed finger to remember him by. Cue a comedic variation on the Frankenstein story, where she uses her knowledge of plants and bodies to bring him back to life, of a sort.
By coincidence, the two main leads of this ultra low-budget film are Grace Glowicki and Ben Petri, who also starred in Honey Bunch, a much more enjoyable experience which benefits from the extra time and money clearly missing from this one. All parts are played by four actors, and everything is shot as if it were a Hammer knock-off from fifty years ago. Garth Meringhi did it 20 years ago, and better.
That feels cruel. The players put their all into the film, and it is clearly a passion project, albeit existing as it does on a shoestring that uses whatever props they could find (the moon is a piece of paper that retains the crease from where it was clearly folded to cut a semicircle for heavens sake). I wanted to like it, and I did chuckle in a couple of places - Glowicki stands out with a committed if not especially funny turn as the gravedigger - but it just seemed to run out of steam as the third act kicked off and it kind of stumbled with little sense towards an unsatisfying conclusion. Its a shame that the day that was full of cracking films, ended on one that was so fair-to-middling. 6/10
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