How could she have survived without food? Was it all a crazy scheme invented by the family? Could something else underhanded be going on? Or could it really be an act of God like so many of the locals seem to believe? I was completely absorbed into the mystery of what was going on in this quiet, rural Irish village. Lib and a nun work shifts to observe the girl - to try to discover if and how she is taking any food, or if she has somehow managed to survive without it. Lib Wright is an English nurse who served under the legendary Ms Nightingale and she has been brought to Ireland to watch over a new patient - 11 year old Anna O'Donnell whose parents claim she has not eaten anything since her last birthday, four months ago. It starts in a dreary, rainy Ireland in the latter half of the 19th Century, shortly after the Crimean War. I suppose it just depends how much this kind of tale appeals to you whether or not you want to know more. I can easily see why it won't be for everyone - truth be told, the plot moves fairly slow - but I was just so engrossed in the story and atmosphere. What was that line in the hymn they’d sung at Lib’s school? The night is dark, and I am far from home. That in these dim huts nothing had changed since the age of the Druids and nothing ever would. Not for the first time this year, she’s the standout in a film that, given the remarkable personnel involved, really ought to pack a greater punch.Lib had a dizzying sense that time could fall into itself like the embers. Pugh’s emblematic, muddy-hemmed blue dress - designed by Odile Dicks-Mireaux - marks her out against the windswept exteriors. The bookending of the film with a contemporary studio setting and thoughts about storytelling falls a bit flat, as does the repeated use of a bird-in-cage thaumatrope.Īri Wegner’s cinematography finds striking tableaux against a backdrop that between the dramatic outdoors and the snotty interiors is almost overpoweringly green. He’s helped by a stellar cast who bring nuance to characters that - with lesser actors and writing - could have played like 19th century cartoons from Punch Magazine. It requires all of the director’s not inconsiderable skill to make these elements work. Every plot progression and twist - from the big reveal to the ludicrous denouement - seems designed to make the average telenovela look like The Bicycle Thieves. Unless you are absolutely fine with weapons-grade melodrama, this is possibly not the movie for you. Still, the mystery of the starving child remains.
0 kommentar(er)
