Tuesday 15 October 2013

REVIEW - IDA


A handsome but hollow tale, gentle and unchallenging, and somewhat affable in that way. What it professes about life is limited, but it is also astute and affecting. Anna is a young woman living in a convent in communist Poland. She is sent by the nuns to stay with her only living relative, an aunt, Wanda, before she takes her vows. Anna's barely in the door at Wanda's, a heavily-drinking single woman who works as a judge, before she discovers that her name's actually Ida and she's a Jew. Level-headed and resolute as ever, Ida wishes to visit the graves of her family, unaware of the circumstances under which they died some years ago, and she and Wanda embark on a brief, but life-changing trip. It's the simplicity that's most effective. Pawel Pawlikowski dispenses information abruptly, though not insensitively, and stresses the banality of these women's humble, deprived existences under communist rule. Yet despite the stoicism with which they approach their joint experience, and the curious mundanity of much of it, its repercussions are pointed indeed. If neither woman's narrative trajectory will surprise you, both will surely satisfy you, as it'd be hard to argue with the choices each makes under such circumstances. And Pawlikowski makes the smart decision to allow much of the film's thematic content to express itself, merely via existing, and there's a not insignificant kernel of intelligence nestled beneath Ida's monochrome veneer, on politics, gender, religion, family etc. That veneer is thoroughly sumptuous, in shimmering dove grey and radiant white, and goodness knows it's a delight to see a director still take the care to truly design each and every frame of their film. But his habit of relegating the actors to the bottom corners of the image to linger instead on blank walls or sky or whatnot is plainly irritating. Whether or not there's viable creative intellect behind this habit is irrelevant - if so, it's too abstract, and either way, it's distracting. Kristin Eidnes Andersen provides the score, which is pleasant.

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