First the bad: La influencia is a Spanish ambiented movie directed by a Mexican director. Slow,purposeless and boring. It attempts to tell the history of a mother that looses all will to live and simple lets herself die after a series of unfortunate events (loosing her job, having no money to pay the bills) not caring even about her two children. It could have been interesting but the director lacks office, we are waiting for something to happen but there are no dramatic highlights. It seems like the director used a pointless gimmick (stop projection around half way, turning on the lights in the cinema, and continuing a couple of minutes later). Around 10 people left, utterly bored. I was leaving as well but ask if the damn thing was over, to be told they did not know... Whatever. I want my money back.

The ugly was undoubtedly Asia Argento. It is very ungentlemanly to disparage about the beauty of a woman, but if you are making a movie about a woman that seems to be irresistible, she has to look the part. She certainly didn't and when the male main character left her stunning young wife (google her, her name is Roxane Mesquida) for Argento's character, I just could not understand what the heck he was thinking. Love may be blind, but I don't think has an IQ in the low 50s. The movie? Lots of kamasutric scenes, paired with period dresses. "Dangerous liaisons" dealt immensely better with the depravities of Parisian high society (although in earlier times, the opera as a place to play all the infidelity dramas was stolen from that movie). As for sex we have seen it all, so throwing more of it at the unsuspecting public is an exercise on cinematic laziness.

In the Q&A session after the movie the conversation centered around the period costumes. A dire indictment of how interested the public was about the attempted plot and topic. Miss Argento was there as well, it is surprising how little many actors have to say about their roles. They seem to be white canvases almost in the most literal of ways.

Finally the good. "Silent Light" of Mexican director Carlos Reygadas is an excellent study of relationships in an unusual setting. The history is the traditional love triangle but in a community of Mennonites in the state of Chihuahua, in the North of Mexico. The strangeness of these people is contrasted against their common humanity and their normal preoccupations. For Mexicans it is doubly interesting because by means of several light touches we identify ourselves with these minority as all Mexican, we realize these fundamentalist Protestant people are as Mexican as Pedro Infante. Reygadas uses non professional actors, which gives his movies an authenticity and immediacy unique in today's filemmaking. He has a great eye for beautiful images that he is now using to serve the plot, in previous movies he was lingering in nice shots just for the fun of it, which worked against the development of the plot.

He also has a passion for showing love not as Hollywood knows it, but as real people experience it. In previous movies of his we have seen love histories involving old ugly women, or obese ones, or a relationship between a posh girl and an ugly fat servant. This time the main characters are middle aged and far removed from the current ideals of beauty, in spite of being white blue eyed.

The ending is unexpected, perhaps unsatisfactory, but courageous in an era when there is little good to say about religious fundamentalism. I, a complet and irredent atheist, was truly moved by the simplicity and quiet passion that these paisanos show for the their religious beliefs and found that a miracle can be presented convincingly without any special effects, bells and whistles.

Well worth watching if you have got a chance.

No more movies for me until next week, have to go out of old Londinum, so I will be missing several promising features. Oh well, such is life, I need a clone.