This refreshingly offbeat film from Argentina follows a few days in the life of Marcia (Tatiana Saphir), an overweight girl working in a Buenos Aires lingerie shop, whose going-nowhere life is interrupted by a pair of sullen, lesbian wanderers named Mao (Carla Crespo) and Lenin (Veronica Hassan). Marcia accompanies them semi-unwillingly at knife point, as the three girls embark upon a directionless odyssey involving taxi-jacking, killer whales, sapphic sex, shoplifting, the beach, and a stay at the boarding house of Lenin's chain-smoking Aunt Blanca (Beatriz Thibaudin). It's an impressive debut for director Diego Luhrman, and a jewel in the Argentine New Wave crown. Shot in beautiful 16mm black and white, the film is sparingly, lovingly framed. Great sound and natural music--overheard from radios--substitutes for the film score, allowing emotions and feelings to manifest themselves organically. With its blend of deadpan hipness and a humanistic warmth that uses style and substance in equal measure, SUDDENLY is a direct descendent of the best French New Wave films of the late 1950's and early '60s. Based on the novel LA PRUEBA by Argentine writer Cesar Aria, it was an audience favorite at 2002 international film festivals such as Locarno, Havana, and Buenos Aires.
IN THEATRES: AUGUST 27, 2003 (NY)
DVD Features:
Region (unknown)
Keep Case
Full Frame - 1.33
Stars
Veronica Hassan: Actor, SUDDENLY (2003)
Tatiana Saphir: Actor, SUDDENLY (2003)
Carla Crespo: Actor, SUDDENLY (2003)
Beatriz Thibaudin: Actor, SUDDENLY (2003)
Director
Diego Lerman: Director, SUDDENLY (2003)
Producer
Sebastian Ariel: Producer, SUDDENLY (2003)
Nicolás Martínez Zemborain: Producer, SUDDENLY (2003)
Screenwriter
Diego Lerman: Director, SUDDENLY (2003)
Maria Meira: Screenwriter, SUDDENLY (2003)
Composer
Juan Ignacio Bouscayrol: Composer, SUDDENLY (2003)
Director of Photography
Luciano Zito: Director of Photography, SUDDENLY (2003)
Source Writer
Cesar Aira: Source Writer, SUDDENLY (2003)
Director of Photography
Diego del Piano: Director of Photography, SUDDENLY (2003)
Review 1:
"...Mr. Lerman creates an intimate power play to contradict the jagged sharpness of the material..."
Source: New York Times
p.E3 08/27/2003
Review 2:
"...A droll, quixotic film about happenstance....SUDDENLY works its charms slowly but steadily..."
Source: Los Angeles Times
p.C12 10/31/2003
Review 3:
"[A] trip that is rich and strange even by the accomplished standards of a new and prolific generation of Argentine film-makers."
Source: Sight and Sound
p.66 03/01/2004