Review of Colossal Youth (2006) by Private U — 01 Oct 2007

Ok, so I could finally stay up the whole time to watch this, the 2nd time around. I had my coffee latte to go with it, and it's still making me jittery, or was it the movie?

It was so much pain to see the film, depicting human suffering in the Portugese slum for 2 and a half hours. But the composition and DV colours were supreme, and the direction was masterly. Most of the actors are kind of reading the lines without much expression, giving us the non-pro actor feel, including the love letter that Ventura kept reciting. But Vanda was one marvelous woman expressing her life and thought on screen. It didn't quite reach a climax for me, but the painterly pictures, poetic stories, and light humour make this one of the best films I've seen this year. The method reminds me a lot of "Syndrome and a Century" and "Still Life" from last year.