Something missing

The top of Arthur's Seat.
Taken on our way into town for another couple of Film Festival films. This time a foreign language double-header in the Odeon. First off was a French film - Sage Femme (the Midwife). It felt very French, with two great performances from the leading actors - the two Catherines - Deneuve and Frot. It seemed to just get on with describing the things that happened to the characters, without any great fanfare over the story arc. Perhaps a little bit too long but interesting none the less, and good to see the actors given the space to act a little. The second film was Sueno en Otro Idioma (I Dream in Another Language) - set in Mexico and mostly in Spanish. It felt a little too long and seemed unsure of its way at times. The story concerned the last speakers of a dying language and the linguist who visits their remote village to try and record the language. The trouble was that the two men who speak the language hadn't spoken to each other for years because of a personal feud. It felt a little created by numbers, with a sprinkling of male gaze in the character of the granddaughter of one of the men who, of course, ends up in bed with the linguist. It was interesting in the Q&A to hear the writer say that he had been hired to write the screenplay, rather than it being his own project. While that is the way the industry works, it might also explain the feeling that the fascinating elevator pitch - 'the last two speakers of a dying language refuse to speak to each other' - rather lost its way in the telling. It was also illuminating when he said he was told that he needed to write a new draft of the screenplay to 'better connect with audiences'. Presumably the words of the producer and just the sort of thing that leads to lowest common denominator film-making. Is too much cinema taught these days, leading to films that have to fit a prescribed model. Too much power in the hands of the gatekeepers - those with the funds but not with the initial ideas - leading to films that tick the boxes but don't really stand out.