Tag: Paula Van Der Oest

The Bay of Silence

Posted on by victorfraga

Based on the eponymous book by English novelist Lisa St Aubin de Terán and directed by Dutch filmmaker Paula van der Oest, The Bay of Silence tells the story of a mother suspected of killing her own son, in a complex and multilayered narrative.

Olga Kurylenko exposes a woman caught in the stultifying effects of a postnatal malaise. Whole scenes, set pieces and silhouettes are dedicated to depicting Rosalind’s descent to certain madness, capturing her own literal description of a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Pillared between the advice of her father (a garrulous Brian Cox), and her husband (an excellent Claes Bang), she escapes with what she believes is one from a set of twins. She flees from England to France, where the nightmares continue. The blame of a near fatal fall – a fall she’s convinced killed her unborn child – drives her from the precipice of certain madness, into the arms of complete insanity.

As haunting as the genre it echoes, The Bay of Silence prescribes to the crime thriller genre, capturing the spectral beauties that wanders every frame. More than that, it’s the tale of a fractured mother, embracing the demons that have put her on this metaphorical and literal cliff. Locating his sickly wife in the Normandy locales, Will (Bang) turns to his stepdaughters for guidance, assurance and information. They speak only in riddles, rhymes and silly noises, calling on their ‘daddy’ to solve this insoluble puzzle.

Kurylenko, riding on an artistic high, is superb, characterising a woman captured by the whims, wills and wants of the many men in her life. Boarding on transport back to England, Rosalind falls into the arms of a handsome Frenchman, thanking him for the foresight he’s offered her. The less guarded Will shoos her away, whisking her back to the safeties England offers her citizens. And yet away from the banks that won Britain the WW2, Rosalind and Will find themselves trenched in their own pit of despondency.

The female gaze is conspicuous. Opening on Rosalind (wading inside the water that carries her louche, light body), the film shows a woman raging against the varying rushing tides. Dying to understand where her husband has hidden himself, the panic settles around her unsettled body. The despair emanates from the inside out. Her smile, chirpily poised at the man who delivers her son, disappears from the onset, seldom to return. And it brings viewers into a character study, painting a woman denied the happiness she so ecstatically hoped pregnancy would offer. Crime thrillers do not come finer than The Bay of Silence, yet this is a more romantic vignette, placing greater import on the horrors within us than the dangers outside.

The Bay of Silence is out on DVD and Digital on Monday, September 28th.

Tonio

Posted on by victorfraga

There is much to be made from death leading to life. Tonio (Chris Peters) is a 21-year-old finding joy through photography. His ambitious father, novel writer Adri (Pierre Bokma), has a differing view on life, while his wife Mirjam (Rifka Lodeizen) plays the peacekeeper in what still appears to be a functional family unit. The film cuts quickly to the untimely death Tonio undergoes and the grief his parents have to endure from now on.

At times the film tries to find answers to grief, an unanswerable commotion, and the performances are stellar. A cutback to the past shows two new parents finding joy sleeping with their new baby. A follow-up shot of the pair, decidedly older looking, drink themselves silently to sleep. There are measures and contradictions here, a senseless death has driven them further apart and closer together.

Bokma is particularly good, fixated on uncovering his boy’s final steps, whatever the cost. Huddled over notebooks, ideas jotted, thoughts plodding, the actor gives a very nuanced performance of a man aged over every parent’s worst nightmare. A hallucinogenic funeral sequence feels especially testing; it demonstrates the sleepiness feeling the parents experience to the audience, scoped in a similar manner to The Beatles Magical Mystery Tour. The scene ends with Bokma, starved of affection, recounting the last time hehugged and kissed his child.

The film operates in an effective non linear manner, changing from the brightly lit kitchen where Tonio informs his mother of a girl he’d like over to photograph forwarding to the same kitchen, now darker, where same said mother declines telephone calls to the outside world. Through his journey, Bokma finds out about his son’s love for vodka (a drink he savoured at parties) and his eager and earnest attempts to seduce a girl he fancied.

Elsewhere, his excessive drinking becomes apparent sitting on a table, his heavy gut open and his bare chest exposed in his private kitchen. Tonio, by contrast, is ordinarily handsome and free spirited, photographing each assignment he is given with excitement. Long haired in rock star regalia, Tonio is everything his father will never again be.

The film ends on an ambiguous note, where Bokma overlooks his sons drawings and personal objects, little indicator of whether the audience should feel happy or sad about the characters fates. But when it hits, it really hits and this is a tale about death that will make you grateful for life.

Tonio is out on October 8th with Walk This Way. Just click for more information and also in order to view the film now.