The Waiting City
Cinema Nova, 20/08/2010
Status: Behind by 7 (and a bit) films
Fiona (RADHA MITCHELL, Surrogates, Phone Booth) and Ben (JOEL EDGERTON, Animal Kingdom, The Square) arrive in India with their paperwork all in order to pick up the baby they have adopted from an orphanage. The local side of the paperwork isn’t yet finalized though, so they have to wait. And wait they do, slowly, slowly deteriorating into frustration, snipes, suspicions and fights.
I didn’t mind the slow pace, given that the film was actually about waiting, but an over-long running time was too much to forgive. An overreliance on Indian mysticism and the kind of travelogue-style discovery of a new place didn’t really work for me, but MITCHELL and EDGERTON live the relationship of their characters - tense and nuanced as it is - and they are compelling to watch.
The film is akin to watching paint dry, but it's atmospheric and beautiful paint.
