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Dir: Abbas Kiarostami, Ken Loach, Ermanno Olmi Italy / UK / Iran 2005 109 minutes CLUB Starring: Carlo Delle Piane, Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi, Silvvana de Santis, Filippo Trojano, Martin Compston, William Ruane, Gary Maitland, Blerta Cahani, Klajdi Qorraj
Portmanteau
films are often hit-and-miss because they don’t give the individual sections
enough room to develop, kudos then to the producers here for matching up three
great complementary filmmakers working in a broadly realist style, offering them
each a half-hour-plus to work with, and using the connecting thread of a train
journey through Italy to maintain a helpful sense of continuity.
The order of play is spot-on too. First up is the veteran Italian Ermanno Olmi’s
offering in which a pixie-ish elderly scientist muses on the kindness of the
attractive assistant who purchased two tickets to make him more comfortable, but
whose kindness has further isolated him from the Albanian immigrants standing
starving in the corridor. It’s a warm and wistful piece, though perhaps lacking
the dramatic snap of the following segment from gifted Iranian auteur Abbas
Kiarostami. Here, an imposing middle-aged lady decides she’s worth first-class
travel no matter what her ticket says and a befuddled inspector has to make the
best of it in the circumstances. As events unfold with roundabout logic,
Kiarostami admirably never tells us how to react to these characters,
contrasting with the final Ken Loach episode which plays on our existing
prejudices about a trio of Celtic fans and the Albanian immigrants whose
fortunes unexpectedly intertwine. With its rousingly affirmative finale, Loach’s
story sends us out with a thoughtful smile, a fitting closer to a worthwhile,
well-observed trip. - Trevor Johnston © Irish Film Institute Programme