Reviews

*spoiler-free till half-way* I wanted to like this film. It has beautiful images from the area and herding of reindeer and costumes from the Sami people. Although it's obvious that most of the actors aren't professionals, I think it's important for the message of the movie that they are played by Sami people and overall they do a decent job.

My issue is with the writing. The film touches on many interesting topics: unemployment among the villagers, the opening of a mine that will bring jobs, but will also interfere with the herding of the reindeer, the distrust between Sami people and the other villagers, alcoholism, depression and suicide among young people. Even the grandmother with beginning dementia and Elsa wondering if she should leave for university could have been interesting plot points. Enough topics to fill a multiple season show! All of these topics are touched upon briefly, but none of them is worked out properly, leaving me either wanting to know more or just not interested.

*big spoilers from here* Then there's the plot of the movie. Villagers kill reindeer to try and chase away the Sami people, because they prefer mining over herding reindeer. A young girl sees one of the killers but is afraid to say anything and ten years later, as a young woman, she wants to finally catch him. It could've been an exciting thriller-like plot. Sadly, the action is too slow, most characters just lack urgency or logic. Most of the plot is Elsa telling her elders or the police what happened and they denying her story over and over again. Then in the end, she tells the story to the police again and now they believe her, because the guy's already dead and they find the dead reindeer in his shed. The story just left me very unsatisfied. I think with better writing and better directing, it could have been an exciting story in an original setting with a strong message, but now it's sadly a mediocre film.

And finally: what about that mine? Did it ever open? Did the Sami fight back? It's never been spoken of again and the story ends with a sentimental message.

By now you probably know what it's about, if not... It's about sex and especially giving head, blowing the job, fellatio, etc. It's expertly written and very funny. All about one subject but at the same time full of ideas. Excellent so far!

However, the pace is so unrelenting, so fast, she hardly can catch her breath (and neither can we) in an unstopped tsunami of words and ideas and similes and it's sometimes hard to keep up, similar to how the spot light cannot keep up with her pacing back and forth on stage continuously.

Definitely worth it, be it overly long and extremely tiring because of the sheer volume of text.

Occupied City is a very odd documentary, comprised of very distinct images and texts.

The images are all of Amsterdam between 2020 and 2023, featuring daily life on the streets: the canals, houses, traffic, people. There are the summers with people lying in the parks and winters with ice skating on the canals. Throughout the film you can see the effects of the Covid-19 crisis, like a big demonstration against governmental measures against the spread of the virus, but also demonstrations against systemic racism, against climate change, remembrance days like May 4th and Keti Koti, the opening of the Holocaust Names Monument, the arrival of the first Ukrainian refugees and also celebrations like King's Day and the arrival of Saint Nicholas. Lastly there are images of - and sometimes inside - buildings and other places that are connected to stories of the second world war and the Nazi occupation. It's a beautifully shot "day in the life" documentary if you just watch the images.

The texts (in Dutch voiced by actrice Carice van Houten or in the English version by Melanie Hyams) is comprised of snippets from the book "Atlas of an Occupied City" written by historian Bianca Stigter, who is also McQueen's wife. Dozens, if not hundreds of little stories connected to an address. Of jews hiding from the Nazis, of resistance against occupation and collaboration with the occupiers.

Sometimes the text complements the images very well, especially when they film from inside the buildings from the stories. Watching people living their lives at places with such a rich and horrific history is sobering. Sometimes (especially after an hour or 3) you find yourself just watching the images, because it's very hard to concentrate on both the image and text at the same time. Just watching the film can be very meditative at times, until you catch another "...and then they were executed in a concentration camp in 1944...." and you realize what you are watching. There are so many stories, dates, names, deaths, that it's almost numbing.

I've lived in Amsterdam for a long time and I recognize a lot of places and all of the events in the film. I've lived in places that had connections to the war, and I've always been conscious of events that took place at places that I know. I was even watching the film in the "City" theater that is featured in the film. So for me it was almost a pleasantly recognizable (if also a very very very very long) watch. To be honest, if you already know many of the things that happened during the war, it's not even that confronting anymore; it's simply the sheer volume of the stories that is overwhelming. I think the absence of interviews and explanations of the images will be confusing to those who don't know the city and don't know what's going on on screen.

All in all, it's a monumental undertaking: years of filming, dozens of stories, 4 hour watch time, to try and connect the stories of occupied Amsterdam to those places in the present. It's a piece of art more than a documentary. I would recommend it especially for people who already have a connection with Amsterdam, who either live there or have a particular interest.

I just want people to know: blackface as depicted in this episode is wildly exaggerated. Yes, "Black Pete" (people in black face) was an integral part of the Dutch "Sinterklaas" celebration and you still see it in rural areas in the Netherlands, but in Amsterdam as in all other dutch cities this is, after years of intense debating over the racist origins of Black Pete, not done. The character is now displayed by people with some smudges on their faces, not the stereotypical blackface as you see in this episode. Certainly you would NEVER see adults doing this and certainty not people just walking around, going to a concert or even working (like the cleaning lady and the bell hop) in blackface. SHM man. I get that it is comedy and supposed to be absurdist or whatever, (the "cult euthanasia' certainly was absurdist, I hope people will get that this is also not done in the Netherlands?) but this displays Dutch people as completely oblivious. I don't get why nobody apparently told the makers of this show. This is commentary to a racist custom decennia too late.

Basic plot: small crew goes on space mission, something unexpected causes physical harm, discussion and/or mental instability among the crew, more and more stuff goes wrong, will they make it or not?

We've seen it before, even in the past year we've seen it before, even on Netflix in the past year we've seen it before! So if you want to make this story relevant you'll have to come with a different take on a familiar plot. This movie doesn't. It's almost paint by numbers story telling and it's just no enough.

From here on there be spoilers.

The movie feels low-budget; it has only 4 astronauts and a non-audible ground control, no scenes on earth or mars. This is not a bad thing, most probably a conscious choice to make you feel like you're on the ship with them and they did the best with a relatively small budget. But this does mean that there are no visually interesting space scenes like a big take-off or introduction of their families back on earth. Even the obligatory space walk is pretty basic visually.

The actors are good; Toni Colette can do no wrong in my eyes, Anna Kendrick is still adorable but in a more serious role and the two men are... also there. They just don't get a lot to do. The problems they encounter are predictable (I mean, the main problem is already in the title) and we don't get a lot of back story for any of the characters. All of them can be summed up in a sentence. Even the discussions about what to do go over without too much conflict; there is some fighting but it never escalates. This in an almost 2 hour movie is just not enough to keep me interested. I also expected some more intrigue; how did the stowaway get there, how the hell did he go unnoticed, why doesn't ground control come with any solutions? All these questions go unanswered. It would be more interesting to find out for example: the stowaway hid intentionally in the space ship, somebody on the ground knew about it, he tries to sabotage the mission. None of that happens. In the end, someone sacrifices their life for the rest to be able to survive, but by then I didn't really care anymore because I knew nothing I didn't expect was going to happen.

I hate to give a movie a bad grade, because there's nothing intrinsicly bad here. If you've never seen a space movie before, you may be entertained. Unfortunately, I have, and I'm not.

I wanted to like this movie. Who doesn't want a heart-warming story about two grandmothers who have loved each other their whole lives and get married in their seventies? There are so many plot-holes in this story I had trouble getting through this short movie whithout turning it off.

• Of course, a movie must have some conflict to move the story forward, but the source of the conflict is very confusing to me. One granny's granddaughter, the other granny's son and an open-minded priest are SO VERY against this marriage that they keep saying they shouldn't marry, and it escapes me why? The only source of conflict is that they say "the village won't accept it". This is never shown by the way, so we just have to take their word for it. Is Spain really this small-minded towards lesbian grandmothers that because "the villagers" will not understand it, two 70-year old best friends can't marry?
• By the way, what is never even questioned is the multiple relationships between other nationalities, a son who converts to islam, changes his name and turns up to introduce everyone to his muslim wife (who never wears a hijab except in the first scene by the way). Also suddenly a congolese man shows up in the last 10 minutes who is apparently dating the mother. All this seems perfectly normal to everyone, so apparently it's only the 70-year old lesbians that are not acceptable?
• Also, the subplot about the girl marrying a Scottish man with bigoted parents goes nowhere and from the first minute it's obvious what's going to happen.
• Do you really not recognize a man you knew your whole life up till 9 years ago when you shared a passionate kiss, just because his hair is a little longer? Also, they do a classic "She's all that" because once the guy cuts off just a little bit of hair and does a little less gorilla-impressions he is suddenly the man of her dreams? I'm exagerating a little, but I was just annoyed with how much this movie is underestimating it's audience.

So many things I found annoyingly un-credible. They could have made an interesting rom-com if they really had focused on the very Christian town being against a gay marriage, (which is legal in Spain since 2005 by the way) and the pope saying "who am I to judge gay people" (which he said in 2013), but this subplot is never really worked out. It just devolves into a screaming chaotic mess that gave me migraines, after which the whole story is wrapped up in the blink of an eye, and everybody apparently lived happily ever after.

Basically, the "main" character Dineo learns at the end not to need man to be happy, but the way she gets there is way too unbelievable and wayyyy too long and boring. She basically falls in love with a random dude we know nothing about (and learn nothing about during the entire film). He turns out to be already engaged and gets married with someone else. Dineo remains obsessed with him. She loses interest. He returns, saying he's divorced (like... 2 months after getting married). She reluctantly dates him again, dumping him after he proposes marriage. All these plot points are totally unmotivated by both characters, as we basically know nothing about them and there's no reason to empathize with them. It seems the only reason she is in to him is because he is ripped, is a good lay and to seem interesting on social media, making Dineo an extremely shallow and unsympathetic character. Dineo's best friend Noni at least has a mildly interesting arch, going from never sleeping with a guy twice, always partying, to wanting a relationship with a guy (Max, a surprisingly okay role by a sympathetic actor) she wouldn't consider boyfriend material at the beginning of the movie. Both main actresses seem fun and capable, but the script doesn't give them much to work with, especially Dineo. The characters don't have any back story, no motivation for their actions and the film doesn't use the actors' talents. What we are left with is a meager plot stretched into an almost 2 hour movie. The actors deserved better.