Enys Men

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source: Enys Men

source: Enys Men

On an island there's a woman you will find, she has strange habits and she's losing most her mind, strange flowers keep her busy, cascading stones may make you dizzy, into a void that one assumes, was sometimes mined. She has a scar across her midriff from a cut, it went quite deep and nearly opened up her gut, along the mark she's growing lichen, perhaps she's rather over ripened, on the horizon, a strange rock protrudes and juts. On occasion she receives a man in boat, we find out later that he's buoyant and can float, although he clearly cannot swim, or make the most of his four limbs, as he's puffed up, and showing signs of a great bloat. Imaginative stuff, but a little too abstract.

Having read the many positive reviews of Enys Men in the media, I was surprised that I had to book a seat in our normally empty cinema but I can now see why. Every seat was taken and I can't say I have ever seen this before. I really didn't know what to expect and I sat next to someone who had already watched the movie and who had come back to see it on a second occasion. I found Enys Men to be visually stimulating being filmed in the way it was and the sound track was incredibly impactive. I shall be watching it for a second time as well as I was taken aback by the metaphors and mix of historical flashbacks. What a pleasure to watch a movie which requires participation and interpretation. Congratulations to those who worked to bring this film about. I have no doubt it will become a cult classic and I can well understand the rave reviews it is getting around Europe.

This film is beyond pretentious. It has absolutely nothing to say yet struts around like it's a seminal piece of 70s experimental art. Ultimately it should have been a short film. As such it would have been pretty good. When dragged out to feature length it lacks basically every tenant of good storytelling. It's cinematography becomes absurdly redundant. How many shots of birds can a filmmaker cram into a film? The answer, way too many. I left the theater not understanding how this was green lit. It feels like an emperor has no clothes moment. The first to stand up and say they had no idea what the film was about and they disliked are will be labeled as simple, unrefined, and not true cinema enthusiasts.

I enjoyed Bait, Jenkins' previous film so I had an idea of his odd dated style. Bait had a much more conventional narrative whereas Enys men is very layered, rhythmic and dream-like. Things like linear time and space are almost blurred occasionally. This film is highly symbolic in an almost Lynchian sense. It's unsettling in a psychological way and not in a traditional horror sense. The horror is from everyday tragedy and the haunted memories this creates. The film is unfortunately rather boring because of the highly repetitive nature of the same person doing the same boring routine day after day. What this film lacks is stylishness and modernity. Jenkins seems obsessed with the ordinary and mundane. There are several close-ups of seagulls flying, waves crashing, woman making tea, reading a book, over and over again..... But if all you show in your films in the ordinary mundanity of life then your films will be feel that way to the viewer. Slowly more unsettling/bizarre elements are fragmented into this bland everyday existence but it doesn't break up the dull pacing. At least after the end of the film me and my friend felt compelled to question what it all had meant. What was the point of this symbolic image or that one. The main theme seems to be about complex unresolved grief. Grief that haunts us over and over. Survivor's guilt - what we should have done to save the person but didn't do. However, there is something more complicated than one person's grief being explored here. There is a whole Island's worth of historical grief but it is unclear how that relates to the main character in the film. I couldn't say I would recommend this film. Maybe someone more familiar with the type of grief it was exploring would get something more out of it.