Horse Money (12A)
Directed
by Pedro Costa
,
Liverpool
13th October 2015
Reviewed by
I have seen some highly impressive films this year, running well into
double figures, but this was the most peculiar of them all, and this is
meant as a compliment.
Very dark, complex and very slow in its unveiling of scenes, it is an
exploration of the 'real', dreamlike and ultra nightmarish recollections
of a 60-year-old character called Ventura (played by Ventura!), an oppressed
Cape Verdean immigrant living amid the Lisbon slums and netherworld.
You see him wandering through remembered spaces in the Portuguese city,
mainly in an abandoned mental hospital, and always in virtual darkness,
with only dim artificial lighting filtering through the almost impenetrable
gloom, metaphorically and literally. This is captured in awesome style
by cinematographer Leonardo Simoes.
Other inmates in there occasionally appear, notably by his bedside in
the opening segment. They are the oppressed and disadvantaged of life.
The film appears to be set in an afterlife where the dead contemplate
their lives and how much time they wasted on meaningless activities.
But there are other explanations about what the film is about. I think
each individual viewer of Horse Money will have their own understanding
of what director Pedro Costa - this being his first narrative film in
nine years - is trying to convey.
In Ventura's memory he is visited by individuals from his past, including
Vitalina (Vitalina Varela), who has returned to Lisbon from Cape Verde
in order to bury her husband.
Ventrura tries to console her that he is "here with me", but
it leaves one baffled as to what he means.
The most compelling part of the film is when Ventura is seemingly trapped
in a lift with an almost motionless uniformed soldier, looking like he
is covered from head to toe in black tar, who took part in the 'Carnation
Revolution' in Portugal in 1974.
Various voices, young and old, emanate from both of them at different
times.
This sequence perfectly illustrates the otherworldly and highly bizarre
nature of the film.
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