By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3 cats
Director: Anna Sofie Hartmann
Starring: Camilla Lau | Christopher Bach | Henning Valin Jakobsen | Jakub Gierszal | Lisa Loven Kongsli | Maren Eggert
Country: denmark, germany
Year: 2020
Running time: 82
IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8955616/reference
Michael says: “GIRAFFE is an interesting film, one that uses elements of fiction and documentary to explore our fragile sense of identity and place. Dara is an historian who is working on an oral history project on a Danish Island where a new tunnel is being constructed to connect Denmark to Germany. Homes have been abandoned and razed two make way for this construction, and Dara explores these places, many of which were seemingly abandoned with little notice, do uncover the community history that will be lost. Like a social archaeologist, she uncovers artifact in these abandoned homes, and interviews former owners to create a record of their lives. At some point, Dara meets a much younger Polish construction worker, Lucek, and embarks on a passionate affair with him. The film is somewhat oblique as to what it all adds up to, with the only other main character being a woman who befriends Dara and works on the ferry that shepherds her to the island and back.
“In her second feature as writer/director, Hartmann explores some important themes about community history, and how progress can obliterate lives, I am uncertain as to the point of the romance with Lucek, other than the irony that Dara becomes involved with someone who represents the destruction of what she is trying to preserve. The film is well-made with strong imagery and a accomplished blending of Dara’s life and the lives she is studying, but it failed to fully capture my attention, and I found it to be a bit meandering. 3 cats”
Screened at the New Directors/New Films at Lincoln Center Virtual Film Festival