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"... a thundering example of style over substance."
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“...a film that generally brings warm smiles rather than belly laughs...”
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"A willing suspension of disbelief should get most viewers across the line."
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22nd Of May (DVD)
Year: 2010
Rating: MA
Director: Koen Mortier
Cast: Jan Hammenecker, Sam Louwyck, Titus De Voogdt
Release Date: January 19, 2012
Distributor: Accent
The Film: 3.0
FILMINK rates DVDs and Blu-rays out of 5“Although it’s a relentlessly dour piece, which some viewers may find unappealing, it’s also deft and intelligent...”
Belgian director Koen Mortier (Ex-Drummer) returns to feature filmmaking with this sophomore effort, a strange, metaphysical meditation on grief and loss. The story follows Sam (Sam Louwyck), a lonely, beaten-down mall security guard whose dowdy existence is abruptly shattered when a suicide bomber targets his place of work. In the aftermath of the explosion, the shell-shocked Sam wanders aimlessly into the city, which he finds to be strangely deserted, and begins to encounter the souls of those killed in the blast.
Mortier's film is a response to the senseless and seemingly random atrocities that, we are told, can descend upon us at any moment. Through the stories of the various victims that Sam encounters, Mortier exposes us to the whole gamut of human responses to tragedy, from anger, to sorrow, to resignation and acceptance.
22nd Of May expects the viewer to come to it, offering no easy ingress into its world, but instead expecting the audience to pay attention and pick up on subtle clues and symbols. Although it's a relentlessly dour piece, which some viewers may find unappealing, it's also deft and intelligent, and although it's not really saying anything new, it's deliberateness of purpose and commitment to mood and character is admirable.
