European Film

Best European Films

From Alfred Hitchcock to Federico Fellini and Ingmar Bergman to Jean-Luc Godard, Europe has birthed many of film’s greatest innovators. And that’s just to name a few. The more you dig into the world of European film, the more and more gems you find. Scroll down to find the best European films currently reviewed on FilmRoot, or pick a country if you know what you’re after:

Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Greenland, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Kosovo, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, North Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, San Marino, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom

Those Who Are Fine – The Bleak World of the Swiss Scammer

Those who are fine Film Difficulty Ranking: 4

If you like your films bleak and unfriendly, check out this shady film which stalks a phone scammer. There’s no bright colours, lighting, or friendly characters to make you feel at home. Those Who Are Fine is for those wanting to step into the lonely life of the phone scammer and the people they affect.

From: Switzerland, Europe
Watch: Trailer
Next: Wild Tales, Involuntary, Post Mortem

The Courtyard of Songs (O Patio das Cantigas) – Portugal

The Courtyard of Songs Film Difficulty Ranking: 2

Image result for o patio das cantigas

If you’re looking for a bunch of laughs after a long hard day at work, watch this. You have the option of watching the classic original from the Portuguese golden age, or the updated version (which I’ve reviewed here). Either way, watching it is your chance to experience life in Lisbon. You’ll meet a mix of Portuguese stereotypes that you’ll quickly fall in love with.

Why Watch The Courtyard of Songs

To see life in beautiful Lisbon!
For a good, light comedy (a rarity on Film Root, for more comedy check out the German Toni Erdmann)
It’s a great alternative to art-house Portuguese film (such as Tabu or In Vanda’s Room) and the old Portuguese classics (Aniki Bobo)
It was recommended by a Lisboeta (someone from Lisbon)

The Breakdown

The film starts with a view of the neighbourhood. We can see lines of colourful bunting stretched across a courtyard in Lisbon surrounded by houses with balconies. A guy with a slicked back hair and a Mohawk walks out onto his balcony, scratches his balls, and cat calls an attractive woman walking past. The woman acknowledges him (luckily they know each other) and the narrator steps in to introduce us to all of the characters in the neighbourhood.

In this neighbourhood, everyone knows everyone. They are like one big family. They fight, they argue, but they will also support each other when it matters (such as when Amalia sings or when Evaristo bails out his neighbours). On the street, they share their emotions: their life ambitions, their love interests, and their gossip, which travels like wildfire. Gossip is their form of news. People are so eager to be on top of the local news, that they all follow the inspector round to try and solve the crime before him!

In addition, pay attention to the structure of the neighbourhood because it is typically Lisbon. The neighbourhood is divided into two levels: the street level, and the balcony level. People go to their balcony when they want to watch life in the neighbourhood and each character uses it differently. Evaristo uses it to watch out for Rosa, another character uses it to cat call girls, Amalia uses it to showcase her figure, and another uses it for his exercise bike. In contrast, people go to the streets when they want to share their emotions and party.

Conclusion

The Courtyard of Songs is great to watch to get an understanding of neighbourhood dynamics in Lisbon. The film is full of wittiness and laughs, a lot like a good episode of Friends. Watch this if you’re interested in visiting Lisbon, and if you want to go make sure you visit during the June festival!

The Life of Jesus (La Vie De Jesus)

The Life of Jesus Film Difficulty Ranking: 4

This is a film for those who are used to art-house films. Some parts are deliberately slow to emphasise the tedium of small town life in France and will put off some viewers. However, there is a lot to like about this film. It has some great acting, an ominous build up of tension, and some moments that would not be out of place in Napoleon Dyanmite. Above all, it is a gritty portrayal of the hopelessness of life in rural France, where there are no prospects or ambition. Think of it as the rural anti-thesis of La Haine.

Why Watch The Life of Jesus?

You want an insight into life in a small provincial French town including, but not limited to:
- Racism: “Are we going to beat up that Arab soon?”
- Brass Bands, including an overly enthusiastic conductor
- Sex and rape: “it was just a bit of fun”

The Breakdown

The first scene shows Freddy riding his motorbike through the French countryside. The road is empty, there are no cars. The background is full of rolling dull green hills set under a bleak grey sky. The colours revolve around a palette of greys to make it seem less appealing. Freddy rides into town and crashes off his bike as he tries to stop it outside a restaurant. He walks in and greets his mum who is watching TV. Life in this town is dull!

Freddy is ashamed to be epileptic. At first, we are sympathetic, however as the film progresses, our sympathy disappears. After one appointment, he throws off the brain scanner and runs out of the hospital. He then speeds back home on his bike without a shirt on, and for the second time crashes as he tries to stop. Straight after the crash, he runs to find his girlfriend for sexual intercourse. It is like he is trying to compensate for his epilepsy by affirming his manliness/machismo.

Freddy is also unemployed and supposedly looking for a job. However, he spends all of his time hanging out with his mates who are also unemployed. To combat their lack of ambition and prospects, they all ride around town together looking for trouble. They need some way of asserting their machismo to compensate for their lack of respect in the town. Unfortunately one of their outlets is racism, and the unlucky guy is an Arab who takes a stalker-like liking to Freddy’s girlfriend.

Conclusion

The Life of Jesus is a no-frills look at life in a remote French village for young men. The lack of dialogue and dulled colours matches the lack of things to do in the area. Although it lacks commercial appeal, the film is a great depiction of stifled adolescent lives. People who push their troubles onto others.

The Pencil – International Competition SBIFF

The Pencil is bleak. It features an artist that travels to a remote Russian town over 1,000 miles from Moscow to be closer to her partner who’s been wrongly imprisoned there. She becomes a teacher who believes she can make a difference, but has to confront a violent bully.

The teacher is a naive ‘Im going to make a difference’ teacher. She’s the Russian version of Edward James Olmos in Stand and Deliver and Robin Williams in Good Will Hunting. However, unlike the two American films, her class bully is from the criminal family that runs the town. A family that has the police department, prison, school, and any other public services in their pocket. The bully is free to extort and bully both his fellow students and teachers.

Unfortunately for her, her naive beliefs that the bad kid would take to her first art lesson are misguided (she’s obviously never taught before). She doesn’t exactly try to help him either when she says he has no talent in front of the class in their first lesson. From there, her relationship with the bully spirals downhill until the naive hope she had disappears.

The Pencil is shot well. You get a real sense of setting – the isolation from everywhere else (you never see a way out), the juxtaposition of the freedom of nature with the oppressive factories spewing smoke non stop and big run down apartment blocks, and the grey colour palette which is brought to life briefly by the teacher on their art walks.

Secondly, pay attention to the pencils in the film as the film exploits them well. There’s the local factories that create them manned by the working class locals whose kids are being taught to use them to create. Using them instead of creating them gives the kids a way out of the town. It’s also a symbol of the naive teacher’s wish to offer her students a way out, which is easily snapped by the bully in the very first lesson. It’s also no coincidence that the ending features the wood logs that are used to make pencils.

The Pencil is a clever bleak film. However, the bleakness doesn’t present the best picture of Russia. It presents a society without hope that is scared of standing up to the corrupt powers in control. If you can handle hopelessness, it is worth a watch.

P.S. To all the audience members generalising Russian (and Eastern European) film as bleak, please watch more movies before making assumptions. There’s plenty of comedies out there, and plenty of bleak American films that present a bleak picture of the U.S. too.

Aniki Bobo

Aniki Bobo Film Difficulty Ranking: 3

Looking for a place to start with Portuguese films? Well here’s your perfect introduction. Aniki Bobo will take you back to the Golden Age of Portuguese film so you can witness the debut film from one of Portugal’s most respected directors: Manoel de Oliveira. In addition, this film has an easy narrative to follow and some adorable and scary schoolkids!

Why Watch Aniki Bobo?

You like Coming-of-Age films
For a look at the golden age of Portuguese film – a precursor to Italian neo-realism
See some street urchins ruled by mob-mentality Lord of the Flies style (this film came out 12 years before Lord of the Flies)
To see Manoel de Oliveira’s first feature film from a career spanning 8 decades!

The Breakdown

The film starts with 9/10 year old Carlitos reciting the Aniki Bobo nursery rhyme (a Portuguese version of eenie-meenie-miny-moe). His Mum reprimands him for moving around while she is combing his hair and the doll he is playing with falls to the floor and breaks. His mum forces him out the house with his school bag which has “Always Choose the Good Path” written on it. He runs to school, bumping into policeman on the way.

On their way into the classroom, all the little schoolkids throw their hats up onto a row of coat pegs and rush into the classroom. No one is interested in their reading lesson which the director shows by a Battleship Potemkin style tracking shot. The shot moves from the back to the front of the classroom, showing all the kids are playing around. The shot stops on Eduardo smiling widely. The teacher shouts his name to start reading, but he can’t read. So one of the nerds (he has slick parted hair and glasses) takes over and reads perfectly.

Eduardo can’t read, but he does win the attention of the girls. He also leads the other kids in games of thieves and policemen. As a result of the following equation, he is obviously the bully.

Illiteracy+Games Ringmaster+Girl getter = The Bully

Sure enough, he gets into fights with Carlitos over a girl that Carlitos pines for. It is their rivalry which is strongly reminiscent of The Lord of the Flies, and the lack of adults in the film.

Conclusion

Aniki Bobo is one of the best examples from the Portuguese Golden age of cinema. In this film, children replace adults which both conveys the lack of adult authority in Porto during the Second World War and serves as a metaphor for adult class relations in Portugal. A classic from a director that witnessed both the silent and digital age of film.