The County, Curzon Home Cinema, 22nd May
Dissent and protest are wrapped up in cosy knitwear in the latest in a mini-wave of Icelandic cinema that taps into the country’s dry humour and rebellious spirit. With its resourceful female protagonist—widowed dairy farmer Inga (played by Arndís Hrönn Egilsdóttir)—and its story of the individual versus an uncaring corporation, The County has a kinship with the previous Icelandic hit Woman at War. Rather than explosives, though, Inga fights with what she has to hand: a tanker full of milk and a hosepipe. A wry charmer of a film.
Take Me Somewhere Nice, Mubi, 21st May
Teenage Alma sets out to meet the father she never knew. Bosnian by birth but raised in the Netherlands, she lost her dad when he returned to the country she now discovers for the first time. Sulky but spirited, she is unimpressed by the striking beauty of the Bosnian countryside through which she travels, driven by whims rather than any real sense of direction. This award-winning first feature by Ena Sendijarevic is unpredictable in its filmmaking, spiky in its humour and impressively textured in its exploration of a complex character.
Hope Gap, Curzon Home Cinema, 12th June
Annette Bening delivers a wrenching performance as Grace, a brilliant and demanding woman who learns that her husband of 29 years (Bill Nighy) is leaving her for another woman. Also starring Josh O’Connor as the couple’s son, this lyrical study of domestic discord has some first-rate acting. Twice Oscar-nominated screenwriter William Nicholson wrote and directs a film that finds wisdom in the poetry Grace studies, and poetry in the stark beauty of the British coastline.
