In the penultimate chapter I said that there is always a but, a fucking but. Because perfection doesn’t exist, it’s just a fucking illusion. That but capable of embittering dramas like ‘The top‘, a film that, above anything possible, but that we can put on it, works as it has to work, in fact, every self-respecting film: tailored to its own ambitions. And within these ambitions tinged with the pristine white of snow that continually frame it, it is an austere, intimate and minimalist drama to which Javier Rey and Patricia López Arnaiz endow it with life, warmth and, above all, credibility. Yes, it is true that the final stretch is somewhat forced. And yes, it is also true that Rey appears as the protagonist when in the end it ends up being López Arnaiz, which partially attenuates the dramatic resonance of the story and the characters. Moreover, the film, as a simple drama about two people broken inside who meet (and save) in the middle of nowhere, has that necessary populist touch that makes it perhaps not good but, there is always a but, it is effective. . How effective is ‘suck‘, a drama about a man constantly fleeing from loneliness who, like Peter Pan, does not want to grow up, and which accompanies Leonardo Sbaraglia on that fine line that separates intensity from hysteria. A difficult balance on the edge of a precipice that keeps us very distracted by the constant doubt of whether the film will end up breaking it or it will end up breaking it. In the end neither one nor the other: But, just when it seems that it is going to break, its director and screenwriter, Leonardo Brzezicki, recomposes it and puts an appropriate rubric on it in a final section that stands out for its calm and measure. Thus, its intensity or hysteria give value, and above all foundation to this “wandering heart” portrayed by a devoted Leonardo Sbaraglia with immature melancholy. Much calmer and more rested it is ‘utama‘, directorial debut of Bolivian photographer Alejandro Loayza Grisi. It is not by chance that the film, about the difficult survival of an elderly Quechua couple in a dying world, stands out for its stupendous and precise work of photography. Or when an image is worth more than the few words said by its protagonists, in what is essentially a twilight western that would be equally understood without words. It is without a doubt the best of a very plastic film which, however, now comes the but, lacks a pulse and has too much contemplative coldness to be equally emotional. It is a well thought-out film (and one that makes one think) but that makes little sense despite the regrets. That’s where even being, objectively, the best of the three seems to win the hand ‘The top‘, more austere but more emotional, or ‘suck‘, more chaotic but more effective. Continue… By Juan Pairet Iglesias
@Wanchopex
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