The Winter Guest

So, I watched this film. What struck me was the fact that the unremarkable quality of this film works in its favor. There is nothing startling about the structure of the film: It is an episodic mood piece. The acting is silently brilliant but doesn't jar one out of the alternately pleasant and unpleasant dream the movie induces. Overall, it's apparently nothing special.

Which is why I loved it. It's a familiar movie, comforting at times, with a commensurate ability to bring tears. The different episodes are well put together, well acted, have touching and applicable messages, and don't make a spasmodic mess of the movie. The cinematographer knew his stuff.

The different plotlines illustrate certain lessons. The two old women on their mishap-prone way to a funeral are perfect models of true friendship and an inability to accept the encroachments of age. When one of the ladies steadies her woozy associate, a theme of friendship through adversity and pain is evoked. This theme is even more beautifully treated in the vignettes of the boys playing hooky. The boys are avatars of youthful potential which might be misspent. The compassion in the boy's spirits, though, is every bit as moving as the compassion the filmmaker had for the boys. The main storylines in which Frances and her mother have an outing brings sharp focus on issues such as family love, mourning, and the generational communication barrier. Holding all these stories together is a deep, melancholic sense of Scotland's chill landscape and the impositions it makes on its citizens. Here the issue of expatriation and the need to escape the familiar is picked up, as well as in Frances' idea of moving to Australia.

When I said there's nothing remarkable here, I'm perhaps being unfair. After all, the most beautiful thing about this film is the fact that the deft blend of pathos and humor seems so hackneyed and oldhat, while it is actually a poignant and outstanding film. After all, what could be more beautiful than a movie in which the ingredients for derivative melodrama are whipped up into a stunning if familiar tear-jerker? By the bye, if movies such as this are the paradigm, the word "tearjerker" is by no means negative.


You'll laugh and cry   April 30, 2002
Kona (Emerald City)
This slice of life story concerns four couples of different ages on a typical winter day in a Scottish coastal town. On the surface, nothing much happens to these people, but actually, the drama of their everyday lives is absolutely riveting. It takes a while to get started, but by the end (especially the song over the end credits) you'll be ready to hit rewind and see it again. It is so painfully touching and real. The writing and acting are superb. Who is the Winter Guest? You decide!


Lovely!   February 22, 2002
This is quite the film. It is very artistic, you will notice the colours used are mainly black and white with a splash of colour in places. Rickman did an amazing job with this film, it is set out in such a way that cannot be described! You have to see the film yourself to fully apriciate it.