Fantastic Films

I have fallen back in love with Netflix this week. There are a lot of really amazing films, some of which I watched this week that really spoke to my love of cinema. My favourite kind of films: independent, low budget films about young women struggling to find their way in their lives. Sure, lots of people find this type of movie to be pretentious or full of cliches or whatever but they make sense to me. They are much more relevant to my life than big budget movies all about men. Some of them show a different viewpoint than the typical male gaze. These films seem to argue that women's stories are worth telling too. The white, heterosexual male isn't the only one with an interesting story worth telling. Sometimes I wish that I had studied film and spend all my time discussing movies like these. 


First film I want to mention, Broken English. This is a beautiful film directed by Zoe Cassavetes, starring Parker Posey as a 30-ish woman working in a job she feels no connection for and trying to deal with her loneliness. Arguably, she does spend a lot of the film looking for love, however to me it didn't read as a desperate woman who needed a man, rather as a woman who is lonely. So lonely that she focused on looking for love as a way to combat this loneliness. It paints a beautiful portrait of a lonely woman in a dull job who just wants something special. There is an honesty to the story and to the emotion. The character of Nora isn't some dream girl or some ideal woman. She feels real. Her friendship with her best friend feels like a real friendship. And yes, it does have a romantic storyline but love is a part of life too. Broken English has real emotion but it is not a totally realistic movie. It is a sort of indie fantasy in some ways. But there is nothing wrong with a fantasy. Who doesn't want to change their life and run off to Paris every now and then? 
Broken English is different than big budget Hollywood love story type movies that pop up so often. There is a sadness and loneliness undercurrent through the entire movie, even the happy parts, even the Paris section. It reminds me of the lonely feeling I get sometimes even when surrounded by other people. Life can be lonely, trying to figure it all out. And of course, Parker Posey is a phenomenal actress which she shows again here.


Nest up was Winter Passing. This film stars Zooey Deschanel as Reese, a young, struggling actress who returns to her dysfunctional home to visit her father after being offered a good chunk of money to publish letters written between her famous writer parents. Reese is kind of poor, does drugs and drinks a lot, and slams her hand in a drawer on purpose just to feel something. She does not have it together. Again, not some Hollywood fantasy type at all but rather an interesting, flawed character. In a lot of ways, Winter Passing reminded me of Garden State if its main character was female and there wasn't a romantic plot. Winter Passing is also about a struggling young person returning home following the death of their mother, with a father that they do not communicate with very well. Both meet some odd characters along the way who inadvertently help them learn to live. That said, I think I like Winter Passing even more. I like that there is no love story. Reese is having a hard time and it is not all fixed by falling in love. It isn't really all fixed at all. At the end she seems to be doing better, but we don't really know how much better. The movie is not devoid of cliches, but it does fare better than some. Reese's father and the strays he seems to have picked up are pretty unique and quirky. However, it does not seem to be a case of genius in their oddity. They just seem to be kind of strange. They all just seem to be weird because they have problems. 
Zooey Deschanel is often typecast as a "manic pixie dreamgirl"-type but not here. Reese isn't anyone's dream. She is angry, sarcastic, numb, sad and a whole host of other characteristics. She isn't the two-dimensional free spirit archetype. She is a complete, multi-dimensional character with positive and negative characteristics. I love this movie. It has a complex female lead and does not rely on romantic cliches. I would consider it a must-see.