Attenberg came with two stellar recommendations from commenters on IMDb: Id rather watch paint dry and I wish I had the hours of my life back. Good enough for me. From the awkward opening scene, when Bella (Evangelina Randou) teaches Marina (Ariane Labed) to kiss, to the closing credits over trucks rumbling through a muddy factory lot, Athina Rachel Tsangaris film riveted me. Bella is Marinas only friend. She describes Marina as a sea urchin and says she doesnt let anyone touch her. Marina has no people skills and no interest in developing them. She watches Richard Attenboroughs nature programs with her father at night. They imitate the animals they see, cawing like birds or screeching like apes. Marinas connection with her father is her only real relationship. He is no lover of humanity and is perhaps the source of his daughters social ineptness. A former architect, he tells her, Man has designed ruins with mathematical accuracy. He is dying of cancer, leaving her alone. How Marina adjusts to his passing and eventually lets him go is the center of the film. In place of car chases and shootouts is the internal struggle of a societal outcast coming to terms with death and loss. Her explosive abuse of a foosball machine is the movies only physical violence. Critics say Attenberg is part of a Greek new wave and compare Tsangaris work to Godards. I dont see it. Tsangari is speaking a language all her own, at once quiet and clamorous, soothing and disturbing, funny and tragic. If it is Godard, it is Godard on mescaline. I find it telling that, after seeing Attenberg during the 67th Venice International Film Festival, Quentin Tarantino said it grew on us the most, and showed another Greece. Too bad he wasnt tuned into the lessons Tsangari is teaching.
Posted on: Sat, 15 Feb 2014 19:55:53 +0000
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