Film

1The Hand of God PAOLO SORRENTINO

Paolo Sorrentino's The Hand of God is sublime autofiction, beautifully carving its narrative from the memories of Naples' youth. The title refers to footballer Diego Maradona’s (1960-2020) infamous handball goal against England in the 1986 World Cup, although the film begins some two years earlier, when the controversial Argentinean joined Napoli, transforming the city.

The film’s protagonist is Fabietto (Filippo Scotti), a curly-haired, cherubic-looking teen who becomes ecstatic when he hears that Maradona is coming to play for the club he’s supported since he was a young boy. He lives with his parents, Saveiro (Sorrentino regular Toni Servillo) and Maria (Teresa Saponangelo), and older brother Marchino (Marlon Joubert). There's also a sister, never seen because she’s always occupying the bathroom. Sorrentino paints these family scenes full of life and warmth.

Sorrentino’s admiration for Italian maestro Federico Fellini is no secret, as the Oscar-winning The Great Beauty showed. Fellini turns up in a scene where Marchino attends an audition (the filmmaker behind La Dolce Vita was known for visiting Naples to find unusual faces).

Although a lookalike Maradona appears, The Hand of God is not a football movie, and indeed, the joy of the footballer’s arrival is soon tempered in Fabietto’s life. Sorrentino draws from tragedy that struck his own upbringing, spinning the film towards a more melancholic and reflective second half. His relationship with the muse-like aunt Patrizia (Luisa Ranieri) is particularly touching, another journey from innocence to experience.

What results is a beguiling exploration of sexuality, creativity and ambition – filled with the joy and pain that life can bring. It is another masterstroke from Sorrentino. Words James Mottram

netflix.com

2Hope MARIA SØDAHL

On Christmas Eve, Anja (Andrea Bræin Hovig) is informed she has a brain tumour, and possibly only three months to live. Fuelled by this devastating news, and strong steroid medication, Anja throws herself into preparing for the worst whilst attempting to put on a brave face for her family, who have gathered for Christmas week celebrations. Director Maria Sødahl draws on her own experience of battling a terminal cancer diagnosis in this deeply moving drama. Because of this, the film takes on a documentarian quality, following Anja to endless hospital appointments and test results that spell doom. But Sødahl recognises that sadness isn’t necessarily the dominant state of mind during a crisis such as this.

Anja is constantly caught off-guard by her own emotions, becoming overwhelmed by the ups and downs of everyday interactions. Anything from cruel offhand remarks from her young children to being congratulated on an achievement at work, sends her fleeing from the room, desperate not to let slip that something is wrong.

Hovig tackles Anja’s fluctuating mental state with reserve – her actions are frantic, and reactions heartbreaking to witness – but she never strays into melodramatic territory. Stellan Skarsgård provides a grounding presence as Thomas, Anja’s on-and-off-again partner. It’s easy to believe that this couple have a long and complicated history. Snippets of their past re-surface, disrupting Anja’s hasty plans, forcing the couple to assess the relationship neither of them prioritised before.

However, for every scene filled with despair, another plants that small seed of optimism that Anja and her family need to survive. It’s this balance that makes Hope such a devastating, yet ultimately warm, human story. Words Stephanie Watts

picturehouses.com

3Natural Light DÉNES NAGY

Dénes Nagy’s prize-winning war drama is a visually astute, if isolating feat, adaped with unflinching authority from Pál Závada’s novel Természetes fény. Set in the dark, sprawling Ukrainian forests during WWII, the film is tethered to the viewpoint of a Hungarian soldier, Corporal István Semetka (Ferenc Szabó), on patrol with his unit.

Within the looming trunks, the light barely distinguishable between dawn and dusk, the visibly tired yet upstanding István maintains his solemn duties and lives to a strict moral code right until a horrific yet pointedly unseen conclusion. Nagy conjures and sustains stoicism in his lead actor, who, like the surrounding cast, is nonprofessional. Dialogue is minimal, with the filmmaker instead choosing to play off the slow dread invoked by an ongoing conflict that ravages the entirety of the forest.

Cinematographer Tamás Dobos uses a bleak, muted palette to amplify the film’s realism, and there are echoes of Andrei Tarkovsky and Elem Klimov’s deeply affecting war horror Come And See in both the film's composition and themes. Yet unlike Klimov, Nagy keeps the violence present, but on the periphery. He, instead, gravitates towards the moral dilemmas of war – being a filmmaker whose background lies in documentary. István is portrayed as a lesser-evil, who nonetheless feels chained to his sense of duty in spite of the evolving terror.

The decision to downplay the war crime – which takes place between István’s unit and the civilians of a small village – may have been a bid to emphasise the chilling and systematic nature of violence at the hands of imposing forces. Instead, it translates as a somewhat guarded and cautious move. As a result, this stunningly orchestrated small-scale study of war feels unshakably hollow. Words Beth Webb