The Love That Remains

Divorce can have a very strange effect on a family, both for the separating partners and for anyone in their household, especially children. The rules of engagement are in flux, with some events feeling uncannily familiar and others being radically different. There may also be instances of unintended but undeniable backsliding, making circumstances messy, uncomfortable and confusing. Navigating the shifting sands of these conditions can thus be challenging, baffling and upsetting for everyone and in myriad ways. So, given these fluctuating parameters, how is everyone supposed to cope with these unfamiliar scenarios? That’s the turf that writer-director Hlynur Pálmason seeks to explore in his fourth – and perhaps most unusual -- feature offering, a series of diverse vignettes that unfold over the course of a year after parents Anna (Saga Garðarsdóttir) and Magnús (Sverrir Gudnason) divorce and seek to build new lives for themselves and their three children. But are they as ready for this kind of change as they think they are? How will it impact their work lives (Anna as a would-be but long-unsuccessful artist and Magnús as an often-absent deep sea fisherman), their relationships with the kids and their interactions with one another, both emotionally and with regard to lingering and obviously conflicted physical temptations? However, in telling their story, the filmmaker frequently seems almost as perplexed as his characters, as evidenced by an uneven, meandering narrative that seldom results in resolution of the various scenarios that arise. This becomes especially apparent in a number of bizarre surreal sequences that seem almost always out of place and do more to bewilder the audience than provide any sort of meaningful clarity. In the meantime, the director struggles to cover these shortcomings by routinely falling back on the inclusion of an array of admittedly gorgeous but largely inexplicable nature photography segments that look like they’ve been culled from a “Visit Iceland” travelogue, along with numerous shots from Magnús’s working life that appear as though they’ve been excerpted from Chamber of Commerce industrial films. Whatever the filmmaker was going for here, though, it feels like he’s often reaching for something that he never quite grasps, making for a visually appealing but ultimately muddled watch for viewers. Pálmason is a genuinely gifted auteur, but, regrettably, this is not one of his better efforts. Invest your time in works like “A White, White Day” (“Hvítur, hvítur dagur”) (2019) or “Godland” (“Vanskabte Land”/“Volada Land”) (2022) instead.

CinemaSerf

"Anna" (Saga Garðarsdóttir) is an artist/sculptor, separated from her herring fisherman husband "Maggi" (Sverrir Gudnason) and bringing up their three kids. It's fairly clear that there is still a degree of affection between them, but it seems more of the can't live with, can't live without variety and her tolerent, even indulgent, approach to parenthood manages to wind him up and cause friction. What we now see is a documentary-style observation of their quirky lives through the seasons on their starkly beautiful island and abroad his trawler that could have been run on testosterone should it ever have run out of diesel. If it were just to have been a typical dysfunctional family drama then it would have been straightforward and unremarkable - none of the acting here really stands out. It isn't though. It interweaves something of the surreal and possibly even the mystic into the plot and there is some fairly dark comedy woven in too - especially when events are seen through the not always so innocent eyes of their sons and their ever vigilant dog "Panda". Conceptually, it's hit and miss, this, but the writing is often quite poignantly entertaining and there is one scene with a visiting gallery curator that pokes some fun at the pomposity of the art world and ends in a distinctly black manner! The humour is generally more of the Scandinavian style, so it can be a little bleak and perhaps ought to warn parents of the dangers of allowing kids to play with bows and arrows or fathers trying to deal with a pesky and agile rooster. Sadly, though, there isn't quite enough of that quirkiness and with about half an hour to go it starts to peter out. It starts to stop making much sense. That would have been fine had the entire story been told in this overlapping and often quite confusing fashion, but that it comes after much of the more pedestrian storyline has been unveiled left me feeling a bit out of kilter. It's worth a look - it definitely has it's moments, but it seems uncertain just what it wants to be, this film.h