Genres

Visitors Review

2012-05-25 20:28:08

Not your Steven Speilberg tragedy

The astonishing thing about this movie is what it avoided: cheap emotional shots. Instead, this movie presents a patchwork of flashbacks and character mosaics in how the town tragedy affected the citizens. The subject matter is not happy, yet there is something beautiful, scary and engaging to it. I am not an emotional person and not easily won over by sad stories. But this had me glued to the screen. I was so impressed, I went out and rented Exotica the next day.

frank 2012-05-25 05:40:33

sweet hereafter

The Sweet Hereafter is a film that is truly original and rightfully wontheGrand Prix and International Film Critics Prize at Cannes, which isprobablymore important than the Director Oscar nomination, because of Cannes' nonpolitical approach to selecting it's winners . It's ideas of tragedy andloss are familiar, but the way in which Egoyan deals with the story isunlike any other.The film is about a tragedy (a school bus accident) that falls upon asmallCanadian town in B.C. First of all, Egoyan manages to capture small townlife perfectly. He shows the various community members as beingindividualpeople, rather than just painting a broad stroke of locals from theboonies.The story is taken from Russel Banks' novel, who also wrote Affliction.There are some significant changes to the book. Ian Holm, a lawyer, hasbeen made into the center point of the story. Egoyan has integrated thestory of the Pied Piper into the story as well. Sarah Polley, a survivorofthe accident, whose character in the book is full of anger directedtowardsher sexually abusive father, has a different perspective in the film.Also,there is a very quick scene of incest between the two that seems to beconsensual on both parties, an image that caused some controversy when thefilm was first released. The ending of the book also featured a sort ofcathartic crash derby that has been completely removed - a welcome changeseeing as how it would be difficult to keep it in the film withoutalteringthe overall feel.Ian Holm is a lawyer who isn't even an ambulance chaser because he doesnthave the energy. He comes to the town to try and represent families whohave lost their children and try to bring any sort of suit that wouldawardthem damages. He, like the families also lost one of his children - hisdaughter. Except she isn't physically dead. Her brain may be becauseshe'sa drug addict, and Holm's relationship with her provides an interestingsubplot that shows the anguish he must feel (although he keeps hisemotionshidden from his face) dealing with a case so close to him.Holm's investigation focuses on Sarah Polley, a girl who was crippled bythecrash, but not killed. He needs her to testify to bring more leverage tohis case. Her father Tom McCamus seems to be a good man from the imageswesee of he and his daughter at a fair and helping her with her music,although the scene in the hayloft(?) suggests otherwise.Bruce Greenwood plays a man who has lost his two children. He allowedPolley to babysit them prior to their death. He is the man who is opposedto Holm' efforts and demonstrates this perfectly when he visits Polley'sparents one evening, and when he confronts Holm at the site where thedestroyed bus has been taken.Gabrielle Rose plays the bus driver and is very effective. We can see howmuch the kids meant to her, how she thought of them as her own, this alsomakes the concluding testimony particularly relevant to her. The entirefilm is summed up at the end when she and Holm meet eyes.Egoyan has kept the interwoven timelines of the book, that may beconfusingfor viewers who don't pay attention, and made them so that the story neverloses its atmosphere. He also demonstrates his already obvious maturity,bynot exploiting the crash itself. He doesn't have sounds of scraping metalor images of bloody children or close ups to shock the viewer. Heplacidlyshows the bus disappear into the icy waters from a fair distance back,alsofrom the point of view of the sole witness of the actualcrash.The film is shot beautifully. It captures the wintry climate to aspectacular degree. There are aerial shots that show the openness of thewhite landscape. The music is sort of tribal with The Tragically Hip'ssongCourage the main theme.The film has a measured pace which allows us to fully feel a scene beforeitjumps to the next. The acting is superb and understated.

2012-05-16 02:55:14

A modern work of genius

I am a pretty discriminating movie lover, but mere seconds after I finished viewing Egoyan's film it shot way up my personal top-ten list. Egoyan's seemless interspersement of shots remind me of another brilliant '90s work by another brilliant '90s director: John Sayles' "Lone Star." Like Sayles, the most impressive talent Egoyan has is his screenwriting. I've been fortunate enough to read the script of "The Sweet Hereafter," and you can really see that the core of this chilling film are its terrifically well-developed characters and its biting dialogue. Egoyan is a true auteur, something that is lacking in movies today. I have two favorite scenes in the film, both of which sent chills up and down my spine (which any good work of art should do). The first is Ian Holm's breathless monologue about the time his daughter got a lethal spider bite. It is the highlight of Holm's flawless performance, and illuminates many of the themes in the film. The second is the cornerstone of the film: the school-bus plunging into the ravine. An inferior filmmaker would inject this scene with so much bombast that it would cancel itself out, but Egoyan is so subtle that the result is more terrifying than any horror film: the bus's slow descent down the hill, the ice cracking beneath its weight, and the look on the father's face as he watches his two children die yet can do nothing about it. I had to rewind this scene several times to firmly grasp what I had just seen. It came as a pleasant surprise (but by no means undeserved) to see Egoyan get nominated for Academy Awards for screenwriting and directing. Just seeing the Oscars merely acknowledge this brilliant film was reward enough (and proved to me that many of the voters must possess some degree of good taste). In my mind, it was akin to the Grammys nominating Radiohead's OK Computer for best album: it didn't have a snowball's chance in hell, but everyone knew it was a work of genius. And sometimes mere recognition is better than anything.

Nathan Schubach 2012-05-15 12:33:34

Depressing Hereafter

My girlfriend and I searched the Sundance section of our local (insertmainstream video store name here), and came about this out of nowhere, butwe really weren't taken by it there, and after we watched it, we reallyweren't taken after it. It was just depressing and confusion all thrownaround into a bus crashing accident which you really couldn't care toomuchabout because of the HIV daughter, the paralyzed lying teen, the kooky busdriver with her stroke-victim husband (?)...it was too much to care aboutattimes. I love the cinematography and placement of the charactersthroughoutthe film, but the overall theme was dismantled.

2012-05-07 04:54:04

A challenging, rewarding and profound movie

Atom Egoyan, who has something of a reputation as a quirky director, has fashioned an adaptation of the complex Russell Banks novel that is at once challenging yet accessible. The basic plot revolves around a town that has suffered an unbearable tragedy - a school bus accident that has claimed children's lives - and how the parents and survivors have to pick up the pieces and carry on. Riding into town to "assist" them is a lawyer (Ian Holm in a tremendous role) who feels they should be "compensated" for their losses. In some hands, this would be a standard John Grisham "Rainmaker" type movie with the good lawyer triumphing over the bad corporations but Egoyan throws us curve after curve in both the narrative and the moral sense. The plot unfolds in a non-linear sense as we float back and forth in time to see what people were and have become because of the tragedy. On top of that, the lawyer must deal with his personal baggage in dealing with his drug-addled daughter's demands on him from long distance. As the story and the characters unfold, we're presented with ideas and issues that leave us with no easy answers yet give us a sense of redemption and even hope. One idea inherent in the movie is that even though none of us is beyond reproach, we still can find peace and acceptance for those things which we may feel are beyond our control. It is a troubling movie at times, but it is also life-affirming and even profound in what it says about not just how we deal with tragedy but also in how we deal with our day to day existence.If you're looking for a movie that has the power to stay with you long after it's over, you'll find it in this one. For those looking for intelligent entertainment, it's not to be missed.

eggboy 2012-05-06 20:19:20

Perfect. Best of 1997.

This is a movie for grown-ups. It tells a compelling emotional story in anastonishing fashion. The plotting is extraordinary, the acting supreme. AtomEgoyan has a remarkable body of work. This film leads it.

slaughterch 2012-05-04 19:43:24

Excellent film but it does require complete attention from the viewer

A wonderful translation from book to film that should be especiallypleasing to serious film goers. The juxtaposition and pov shift in criticalscenes keeps the audience on its toes. This is not a coke and popcornflick.Exceptional on DVD.

2012-05-04 12:08:10

The Nasty Now-and-Now : What children quietly and painfully know about their families

The simple fairy tale THE PIED PIPER OF HAMLIN becomes the connective tissue of this very engrossing screenplay about the supposed idyllic lives of a rural community in snow-covered Canada. The children have disappeared to The Sweet Hereafter from a school bus accident.Why? How? What could have possibly caused this to happen? As The Pied Piper lead his townschildren away from the harm of the adults, so too these children in rustic Canada have gone on to peace. This is the story of THE SWEET HEREAFTER.Lawyer Mitchell Stephens (Ian Holm) comes to this close-knit (almost closed) town to investigate the accident and to offer the promise of financial retribution to the parents of the dead children. What follows is a very slow and methodical look at the secrets that are hidden within the lives of the people. On the outside, everything looks picture perfect; but as this film unfolds we discover, in a very poignant way, the really dark undercurrents that lie beneath the surface of the townspeople who "always act as a community." One teenage girl,Nicole (Sarah Polley who just triumphed in her 2006 directorial debut in AWAY FROM HER)is the sole remaining child alive, and she knows the town's secrets. She has a painful one of her own.Does she expose all of those secrets or does she remain mute or lie? As Lawyer Stephens probes into the accident, the dark and deep wounds of his own relationship with his drug-addicted daughter are painfully and gradually brought to the surface.This film has so much to say about children-what they see, hear,observe and know.It grants intellect and wisdom to the characters of children who, though innocents, supposedly, are capable of perceiving adult action and feeling the deep effects of it. The children are the real subjects of this film, and yet they have so little screen time, apart from Nicole, who is the "left-behind" lame child who speaks (or may not speak) for all of those who are injured by adult actions. This film is so sly and subtle that to miss one glance or one picture on the wall or one passing remark reduces the entire impact of what this film has to say.Adults have agendas...and children know it!!!!This film is a stinging indictment on adult frivolity and the keen observation of the innocent.This film was especially relevant to my "wonder years" as sexual abuse, drunkenness,manipulation and dark secrets were THE major mode of operation in our family. We three children all knew the evil that was being perpetuated in our "idyllic" 1960's home as well as in the other "perfect" homes of our neighborhood friends. Oh the things we knew and the awful secrets we were forced to keep!!!! Oh, that The Pied Piper of Hamlin had lead us out to The Sweet Hereafter..........WE WOULD HAVE DANCED AND FOLLOWED GRATEFULLY!!!The soundtrack by Mychael Danna is appropriately renaissance in flavor, scored with flutes,recorders and tambourines.Perfect companion films would be INTO THE WOODS and THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY.

mnw1989-1 2012-05-02 07:43:53

Wonderful and touching

Terrific movie! Touching, sweet, affecting! Wonderfully acted tale of asmall Canadian town's reaction to a fatal school bus accident. Ian Holmturns in yet another brilliant performance as a loathsome attorney whoconvinces grieving parents of some of the victims to file a classaction suit against those responsible for the accident. He is alsodealing with the tragic death of his own drug-addicted daughter. Hisbitterness toward her death leads him to pursue these mourning parentsvery aggressively, causing great conflict and divide amongst thetownspeople. A shocking and thought-provoking film. I would have giventhis movie a 10 except for the last 10 minutes. Disappointing ending toa truly special movie. Still worth watching!

2012-05-01 15:27:17

Continues the "Exotica" Themes

This review is from: The Sweet Hereafter (DVD) In "The Sweet Hereafter" director Atom Egoyan expands on his view of the free will versus destiny argument. As in his earlier film "Exotica", exercise of free will is generally limited to the choice of substitutes. The process of living being simply a process of substitution. We grow out of things and find substitutes for them. We lose something precious but we carry on by finding a substitute. We need something we can't have so we find something that works as a substitute. Sometimes the substitutes are an improvement on the original, sometimes they are a better match with a new stage of life, sometimes they are an imperfect substitute but the best that we can manage, and sometimes (certainly in "The Sweet Hereafter") they can become an addictive trap that keep people from moving on. Substitutes that signal an acceptance of the need/opportunity for change are generally positive. The Otto's substitute an adopted child for the son they can't have biologically, Billy's affair with Risa is a substitute for his dead wife and he is a substitute for her inattentive husband. Billy's children substitute Nicole for their absent mother. Delores substitutes the children on her bus for the children she has been unable to have. Not so positive are substitutes that inadequately compensate for the unattainable. Mitchell Stephens serves as a victims' advocate as a substitute for his inability to influence his daughter's self-destructive behavior, his zeal to compensate impairs his basic humanity and good judgement. And the vicarious thrill Sam gets from his daughter's musical career is a substitute for his failure to achieve that kind of success.But the most dysfunctional substitutes in "The Sweet Hereafter" are those chosen as a way to "delay" acceptance of a change. Sam's incest is a way for him to delay confronting the fact that he is growing old. The initiation of legal action over the accident is not just a way to release anger but a way to delay acceptance of the loss and of having to confront living without the children. Billy has already been through the grieving process and understands that delay is a bad idea.But Egoyan also wants us to understand that while we can freely choose our substitutes, we are subject to random events that are beyond our control. Some of these are accidents, with varying degrees of human complicity; some are just events that happen outside human control. Like those who die on the "Bridge of San Luis Rey", there was a randomness about the victims on the school bus. Some survived the accident itself, Jenny stayed home sick that day, and Danny begged to stay home but was placed on the bus by his mother. Stephen's story about rushing his three-year old daughter to the hospital is inserted for a reason. He recalls being willing to do whatever had to be done to save her life. He still feels that way but is powerless to change her downward spiral, and consumed by guilt over his real or imagined contributions to her mental state. He cannot help her so his substitute is to help real and imagined victims. Symbolized by the broken car wash, Zoe's rejuvenation is impossible, as is his until he accepts what he cannot control and no longer needs to compensate with a substitute. Like Stevens the town must accept what has occurred and learn to live in the strange new childless place that it has become. Look to the movie's title.Foreshadowing occurs when Risa comments to Billy that his following the schoolbus gives his children something to look forward to, just as the two of them look forward to their motel room hook-ups. Sam and Nicole look forward to their rock concert fantesy "kissy" sessions by candlelight in the barn. And a community's children are its looking forward factor.Robert Browning's "The Pied Piper of Hamlin" - is inserted at various points in the story as a counterpoint for the town's three pipers. 1)Mitchell Stephens has come to rain ruin on this town by seducing the townspeople with the prospect of delaying their acceptance of the tragedy. 2)Sam has seduced his daughter with a fantasy that played upon her desire for his love. But the randomness that made her a "wheelchair girl" has also liberated her. 3) Nicole is angry like the Piper and lies to put an end to the possibility of a successful lawsuit. Her lie both implicates and liberates Dolores who otherwise would have continued to live in the town, believing that her neighbors did not hold her responsible for the accident while subjecting herself to the daily reminders of her absent children. Her new job and life in another town is a constructive change and the film's final substitution. Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.

jerome-23 2012-04-30 00:53:24

Immensely Subtly Strong Human Disaster Film

It's an immensely subtly strong film, with only one haut violentsentence, violence from the only bystander to the protagonist lawyerwho is saved only by his cell phone. A view of how a small Canadiantown survives with the omni-distasteful human disaster that is multiplechild deaths.Polley's Nicole is fed up of the ongoing, physical sexual abuse fromher father. The viewers are shown that this is accepted in theirrelationship, it is not physically forced nor psychologically forcedbut psychologically justified by the father to the extent that theyappear as if they are in a contented father-daughter relationship. Shestops it all, Casteneda-style.The entire film is a build up to the trial, the surviving parents andtownfolk vs. those who are blamed, the alledgedly-faulty-busmanufacturers in a compensation law suit. Until you realise, when thisyoung lady in an abused girl now wheelchair-bound post-accident, tellsa strange and new statement in court that stops the case, that this isnot the film. The film is the situation, in a more filmic Mike Leighsoaking-up-the-atmosphere style human and human interaction film.The abusive father is played frightfully well, by an Egoyan actor whomalso starred in Exotica, with his disturbingly grimy hair that hebears. It's his relationship with her throughout the film that sickensthe underlying ongoings in the town, he has such a hold over her thatshe willingly, in strong contrast to the razored and totallypsychologically blocked abuse within the Palmer family in Twin Peaks,gets into bed with him, in the incident shown in the film, into a bedof hay lit powerfully by candles and accompanied by a guitar.Polley wrote and performed the lead vocals in the music.There is the air the Polley's character has stopped her abuse by heract, at least made an effort to get the town to look at her in theirquestion of why, but the audience is not in any way told this andinstead left with the fact that she is now far less capable of stoppingher fathers incestuous abuse.The snow setting is apt and the snow repelling teepee-like house of the'hippie' parents with an adopted child named bear is an interestingtextured object.There is a lot to this film. It is a enticing and unusual journey bestviewed.--- by Jerome, computer coder, author, and voter of 1,000 films.

faraaj-1 2012-04-29 16:58:36

Intelligent themes but weak storytelling

Atom Egoyan deals with social themes and intelligent ideas in hismovies, the best of which was Ararat. His subject matter is neverrun-of-the-mill or commercially focused. Ararat dealt with the Armenianholocaust by the Young Turks circa WW-I. Egoyan may have broughtspecial passion to that project because he himself is of Armenianorigin. The Sweet Hereafter, made five years before Ararat is clearlythe work of the same director. He deals with social themes, human painand suffering and has the same distant style of storytelling which isnot geared to warm audiences. If you like art-house films and have thepatience to sit through a slow-paced film, you may find The SweetHereafter a rewarding experience.The central "plot" revolves around a school bus crash in a small-townand the efforts of an out-of-town lawyer, played by Ian Holm, to cobbletogether a lawsuit for the survivors and families of victims. He is aman who is grappling with his own demons. Divorced from his wife, hehas only one daughter who is a heroin junkie and he may be to blame forher alienation and wasted life. I won't comment more on the intricateties between the lives of the people in the town, however, no one comesout looking good with perhaps the exception of Sarah Polley who was anaspiring singer now crippled by the accident. What is admirable aboutThe Sweet Hereafter are the themes it explores. The major problem thatI've had with Egoyan's other efforts including Ararat is that he takeshis time making his point. True, he is dealing with complex subjects asopposed to plots. But, he doesn't know how to draw audience interest -the tricks of the trade that a Wilder used in The Lost Weekend or anOtto Preminger displayed in several movies. I also think that if DonaldSutherland had indeed been cast in the role of the lawyer instead ofIan Holm, he would have added a dimension to a character that is quitebland.

2012-04-27 02:17:02

"We've both lost our children. They're dead to us."

A mountain community's calm is shattered when a terrible school bus accident occurs that leaves everyone dead except two people: the bus driver and a now crippled teenage girl. (Sarah Polley) Mitchell Stevens (Ian Holm) is a lawyer who flies into the community to gather a lawsuit that will profit the parents. (and give him 1/3 of all earnings) Things immediately go awry, as parents argue with one another over the logic of filing a lawsuit, while the general feng shui of the small town is destroyed as trust and familiarity is lost.Amazingly enough, although people may readily blame Ian Holm for all this, it seems as if the town has always had a few dark secrets to hide. Billy, who loses two children in the accident, tells one group of parents that they "used to be a community - they'd help each other out." Yet he was continually having an affair with the wife of a member of that community. There's also suggested incest between Sarah Polley's character and her father. There's no doubt that the community was built on lies, and Stephens cannot be "shattering" it as some synopsis and reviews have said.The film is very heavy on character. You get to know everyone, and actually do get to care for them. Even Ian Holm's character is given depth through interaction over the phone with his drug-addicted daughter, and further developed in a monologue where he describes saving his daughter at a young age from a Black Widow bite.The only fault with the film is, amazingly enough, while it may seem to drag it also seems to be resolved too quickly - when it's over, you'll almost think it was too short! In thinking about why this is, I think I have to agree with one previous reviewer that the film may have put too much emphasis on character. I know this may sound weird (especially since a lot of my past reviews I've urged greater character development) but it feels like a lot of build-up to a not-so-climactic ending. It's a bit strange to say without giving away spoilers, but hopefully some of the other reviewers (or people who have seen the movie in general) can get what I mean.Still, it's an overall good film. Some might find it slow, but it is well done in the long run. Fine acting by all (especially Ian Holm and Sarah Polley) and it makes certain every character is worth their place in the script. I'd give it a chance if you're in the mood for a film like this.

shhazam2 2012-04-26 06:51:42

Great story which could be better told

Despite the director Atom Egoyan's misuse and overuse of flashbacks andflash forwards, this movie contained a great story.A terrible tragedy from which there was no emotional relief for thesurvivors except the chance for one to exact punishment for incest andchild abuse.This story could have been told almost strictly chronologically frombefore the accident to after the accident without misusing theflashback technique and saving that technique for some of thebackground of the attorney which was still very well played by IanHolm.Be patient with this movie and forgiving of the flash back misuse andyou will have seen a gem of a story told about a tragic happening.

Nate Horwitz 2012-04-25 23:25:29

Over-rated

This movie has what I would call the "veneer of depth" that is, on thesurface there seems to be a lot going on but there's really not much to it.I think a lot of people who don't think that they understand it have beensuckered into thinking that this movie is something that it's not-a complex,interesting film.

Jim Chevallier 2012-04-25 22:21:27

Architecture at the service of emotion

The film has an almost musical structure in the way it interweaves themes sothat they illustrate each other: the insurance lawyer's relationship withhis daughter parallels the incestuous father-daughter relationship thatdrives the denouement, so much so that it's almost as if his own daughterhas intervened in the current situation to punish him once again. The use of"The Pied Piper of Hamelin" to suggest both childhood and malevolence isanother example, as is the whole technique of telling two stories at once:the insurance struggle and the original bus crash (which is drawn outthrough almost the whole film.)All these interwoven themes give the movie a quiet tensile strength, sothat, even as it appears to wander from one time and incident to another, itis in fact so rigorously constructed that the viewer is being lead bymultiple roads to one breathtaking climax - that in turn illuminates thevarious situations that have lead up to it. The incestuous father ispunished; the unsatisfactory father is punished; even the echo of the PiedPiper story is 'resolved' with the image of the single crippled child whowas left behind, and who here becomes the hero of the tale.All of this is subtle, and at the service of emotion and evocation. Theapparent subject of the movie is inherently powerful and affecting, yet issimultaneously used to explore a more commonplace drama: the multiple waysin which fathers may fail their daughters. The insurance man's failure toreach his own daughter is as tragic in its way as the death of a busload ofchildren.I haven't re-viewed it, but I presume it's one of those movies which replaysmultiple viewings, since so much of what seems trivial or fortuitous at thestart has its purpose in the structure revealed later on. In this sense,it's like any coherent work of architecture, requiring you to view the wholebefore you can appreciate the balance of its parts.Jim ChevallierNorth Hollywood, CA

2012-04-25 22:03:58

Still Haunts Me

Without trying to be haughty, I feel truly sorry for reviewers who disliked this film. You really missed the boat. This film is so subtly and poignantly beautiful, so well crafted, so perfectly scored and acted, that my wife and I literally puffed out a long, deep "Wow" upon the film's conclusion. The character portrayals, the metaphors, the messages relayed concerning human nature and our society, also make this film an excellent subject for intellectual discussion. We rented this film 10 months ago, and still reflect on it regularly. If you enjoy films that make you think, that require you to participate with your mind to garner the film's intent and purpose, and that can state all that needs to be said through a well-filmed, perfectly conveyed facial expression, you will love this movie.

2012-04-25 02:09:40

Skip book, see movie

Books are almost never based on movies and so we have no way of judgingwhether they would be better or worse than the originals. Movies, on theother hand, are constantly being created out of other materials. Whetherthis is simply a historical accident due to their recent arrival on thescene we'll never know. But we do know that movies are almost universallyinferior to the books they're based on, at least in how well theytranslatethe book author's original vision.The Sweet Hereafter might be an exception to this. Based on Russell Banks'novel of the same name, Egoyan's Hereafter raises an at-timesundistinguished novel to a different plane. Where the novel gives usfirst-person accounts that sound a bit phony and too much alike in places,the movie gives us well-cast characters whose differing points of view areas clear as the film's wintertime images.The novel takes place in upstate New York. Inevitably, Egoyan has movedthesetting slightly north and made the story slightly more Canadian (how elseto account for the presence of the ever-so-non-American Ian Holm). But indoing so he has also pared away some of the novel's fat. In particular heeliminated the goofy pseudo-mythical final section at the county fair dirttrack, a chapter that feels like something out of Robert Coover's TheOriginof the Brunists. It's almost as though Egoyan saw and understood thisstorymore clearly than Banks did. I can't think of higher praise for adirector.

ollieoxen27 2012-04-20 14:32:26

Chinatown on Ice

Do not read this if you have not seen the Sweet Hereafter: This film isa haunting representation of the secrets, lies, betrayals, and othersins within families, the resulting tragedy and the power offorgiveness. Incest is the underlying sin and the relationships betweenthe Sarah Polly character and her father and Billy Ansel and hisdeceased wife (daughter). Even the relationship between the lawyer andthe daughter who he never really betrayed is seen as fragile and whatcan happen even when a parent does nothing wrong.Notable in this production are the slow pacing, the sound, the Armenianmusic, the cinematography, and the exceptional acting. All thecharacters are people you think you knew at some point and the filmslack of sentimentality and gratuitous violence is unprecedented in amovie of this type. The spiritual ending with the girl smiling whilewatching the ferris wheel and the same girl spreading her arms like anangel facing the car headlights about to meet her fate are imagesyou'll never forget. This movie is the real deal, one everyone needs tosee.

2012-04-19 18:45:46

Excellent

If you are looking for a movie with lots of flashy special effects, lame acting, and no plot, forget this one.If, however, you are looking for a movie with depth, humanity, and feeling that is brilliantly written, acted, and filmed, then this is the one. Without question, this was the best movie of 1997. It did not have the commercial hype of the bloated "Titanic," nor did it have the pretty boys of "Titanic" or "Good Will Hunting." What it does have is an exquisite observation into human grief and mourning. DO NOT MISS!