CANNES PRESS WRAP 2019 - THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap - Celluloid Dreams
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CANNES PRESS WRAP 2019
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 1
www.wolf-con.com
CONTENTS
SELECTED QUOTES p. 3
TRADE REVIEWS p. 4
REVIEWS p. 9
FEATURES / INTERVIEWS p. 36
MENTIONS p. 41
PHOTO / VIDEO / RADIO BREAKS p. 43
SELECTED TWEETS p. 53
INTERVIEWS COMPLETED p. 56
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 2
The Swallows of Kabul - Press Quotes
Completely gorgeous.
(LA Times)
Graphically rich... dramatically and poetically right.
(Variety)
This film threads an undying hope for the future
through every shade of its tragedy and sacrifice.
(Roger Ebert.com)
An aesthetically and narratively beautiful example of the affecting power of essential,
humanist, and feminist ideas that auteur animation offers, and which can reach broader
audiences of both adult and younger viewers.
(Cineuropa)
Visually arresting and emotionally engaging.
(Eye for Film)
Engaging and captivating.
(Cinefilos)
Not to be missed.
(Taxidrivers)
A visual cinematic poem.
(EFE Agency)
Ultimately touching... beautiful watercolor-like animation.
(Film Companion)
An animated jewel.
(RTVE)
A terribly tragic story painted with such beautiful colors. Broke my heart. One of the saddest
films I‘ve ever seen with some of the most stunning animation. Proves there are sparks of
humanity even in a world covered by so much darkness.
(First Showing)
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 3
TRADE REVIEWS
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 4
May 16th, 2019
Alissa Simon,
Cannes Film Review: ‘The Swallows of Kabul’
Two female directors co-sign this involving adaptation of Yasmina Khadra’s elegant literary fiction
about life under Taliban control in the Afghan capital.
The long-awaited, graphically rich, 2D watercolor-style animation “The Swallows Of Kabul” from French
helmers Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec provides an involving adaptation of Yasmina Khadra’s
elegant literary fiction. The book, an international bestseller about life under Taliban control in the Afghan
capital, highlighted a dangerous act of humanity during a grim and violent time via the stories of two
couples whose fates become intertwined through death, imprisonment, and remarkable self-sacrifice. This
supplies the core plot of the film, with the action condensed into a tight 81 minutes. Purists may object
that the prestige production takes some liberties with novel, but on the whole, the inventions by screenplay
writers Sébastien Tavel, Patricia Mortagne, and co-helmer Breitman feel dramatically and poetically right.
The action unfolds in 1998 (as opposed to the novel’s 2001), shortly after the fundamentalist Taliban
have come to power. Historian Mohsen (voiced by Swann Arlaud) and artist Zunaira (Zita Hanrot) are still
young and in love. They remain hopeful that they will once again be able to live as they choose in their
beloved country. In contrast, the despair-filled prison warden Atiq (Simon Abkarian) and his terminally-ill
wife Mussarat (Hiam Abbass) live as if they are already dead. Stoic war vet Atiq has seen too much horror in
his life and is unable to express to his wife how much she means to him. She, meanwhile, suffers because
she can’t fulfill her wifely functions of shopping, cleaning, and cooking, and because she never bore him
a child. It’s the characterization of Mussarat that winds up being the most slighted from the condensing of
the novel.
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 5
May 16th, 2019
Alissa Simon,
Spoiler alert for those who haven’t already read the novel: Zunaira winds up in Atiq’s prison, condemned
to death for murder. For the Taliban, the opportunity to execute a woman called for special pomp and
ceremony, which the film depicts in chilling scenes. Whether it is the faceless, burqa-clad prostitutes stoned
to death by crowds after a sermon by a ranting mullah or those kneeling unfortunates blasted in the back
of their heads by a Kalashnikov in a soccer stadium full of VIPs, these scenes may be distanced by the
drawings, but are still very difficult to watch.
Co-director Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec, who is also responsible for the overall character and graphic design,
earned her stripes as an animator on popular French features such as “Ernest and Celestine” and “The
Rabbi’s Cat.” In a way, the delicate aquarelle graphics have a taste of the former, even while evoking a
derelict, war-devastated city where turban-clad men race around in Toyota pickups, whipping pedestrians
and firing guns simply because they have the power to do so.
As a medium, animation suits this adaptation well; it would have been nearly impossible to shoot as live
fiction or on location. Here the drawings communicate quickly what took several pages of description and
dialogue to express in the novel, whether it is Mohsen’s memories of better days at the cinema shown as
a time-lapse sequence of hand-holding couples in Western clothes or Atiq’s merciless Taliban superior
Qassim (Sébastien Pouderoux), as he lolls in a brothel, his long legs pinioning the young girl he is holding
on to. Particularly striking are various subjective shots from behind the eye-screen of a burqa, and a climactic
scene, in which a man peers into that mesh barrier from the other side, trying to find his wife’s eyes
Marking her fifth feature as director, Breitman, who is also a popular actress and director of television and
theater, decided to capture her voice cast during live performance rather than simply as voices standing at
a mic. This approach lends extra authenticity to the sound and rhythms of the acting, which will be more
difficult to replicate if sold to other territories where dubbing is common. Breitman’s father, Jean-Claude
Deret, is especially poignant as an elderly former mullah who despairs of the direction his country is taking.
In addition to the standout work done by a large team of animators, mention should be made of the
redolent sound by Eric Devulder, Pascal Villard, Bertrand Boudaud, and Eric Tisserand and the evocative
score by Alexis Rault.
https://variety.com/2019/film/reviews/the-swallows-of-kabul-review-1203217257/
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 6
Screen Daily
May 16th, 2019
Tim Grierson,
Effective animated drama about two couples struggling under the
cruelty of Taliban rule
Two couples at very different phases of life find their destinies intertwined in The Swallows Of Kabul (Les
Hirondelles De Kaboul), a melancholy animated drama about the cruelty of Taliban rule. Giving Yasmina
Khadra’s 2002 novel a tasteful watercolour treatment, directors Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec
risk stripping away the story’s moral indignation in favour of something more bittersweet and restrained.
And yet, this tale of repression and injustice is potent enough to overcome the inevitable distancing that
occurs because of the animation process.
The unassuming approach has its rewards — most pointedly, that it puts the film’s ironies in stark relief
Premiering in Un Certain Regard, Swallows also screens in Annecy next month, and fans of adult-themed
animation, particularly the recent acclaimed The Breadwinner, will seek the film out. A voice cast that
includes Simon Abkarian and Hiam Abbass will further attract buyers, and positive reviews should also be
a benefit.
Living in Kabul in the summer of 1998, passionate young lovers Mohsen (voiced by Swann Arlaud) and
Zunaira (voiced by Zita Hanrot) try to make the best of the fact that their freedom is severely restricted
under the Taliban. Meanwhile, a disillusioned middle-aged couple, Atiq (voiced by Abkarian) and Mussarat
(voiced by Abbass), aren’t just contending with dangerous fundamentalists — her cancer has progressed
to such a point that death seems imminent.
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 7
Screen Daily
May 16th, 2019
Tim Grierson,
Breitman, a live-action filmmaker, joins forces with Gobbé-Mévellec, a cartoonist, character animator and
director, and Swallows has been produced by Les Armateurs, the French company responsible for The
Triplets Of Belleville andErnest & Celestine. The co-directors first shot with their cast, however, using those
filmed scenes as the basis for the final animation. The result is a movie that has a gentle, lived-in quality
associated with hand-drawn animated projects.
The reserved tone sometimes undercuts an infuriating, heart-breaking study of individuals whose existence
is hemmed in by the Taliban’s monstrous behaviour. Swallows features everything from stonings to mass
executions — to say nothing of small, daily indignities — and certainly there’s an argument to be made that
a live-action telling would have simply been too much for an audience to bear. But to a degree, the delicate
animation anaesthetises the viewer, allowing us to appreciate the artistry on display rather than focusing
on the Taliban’s barbarism, which is often shown off screen. Admittedly, that storytelling remove is a relief,
even if one occasionally longs for a more visceral take on this anguished material.
Still, the unassuming approach has its rewards — most pointedly, that it puts the film’s ironies in stark relief.
Atiq is a guard at a women’s jail that incarcerates blasphemers who will be killed for their crimes, but his
life at home is its own kind of prison because of Mussarat’s failing health — not to mention a rising division
between husband and wife. By comparison, Mohsen and Zunaira seem relatively carefree, but they, too, will
soon discover how the Taliban’s strangulating grip affects every aspect of their beings.
Alexis Rault’s muted score mostly resides in the background, underpinning key moments without
overwhelming them, and likewise the voice performances eschew hysterics, letting the story’s growing
despondency reveal itself unadorned. Swallows doesn’t try to wow us with fanciful sequences or cutting-edge
animation techniques. If Breitman and Gobbé-Mévellec’s pacing is occasionally too slow — at 81 minutes,
the film feels a bit slender — the unexpected intersection of these two couple’s lives builds to an ending that,
while melodramatic, articulates in simple language the horror that’s been around them all along.
https://www.screendaily.com/reviews/the-swallows-of-kabul-cannes-review/5139512.article
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 8
REVIEWS
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 9
May 16th, 2019
Fabien Lemercier,
CANNES 2019: Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbe-Mevellec dive into the Taliban’s Kabul and achieve
a very beautiful animated adaptation of Yasmina Khadra’s novel
“No man owes anything whatsoever to a woman.” In Kabul, capital of Afghanistan, in the late 1990s, the reign of the Taliban has plunged local
society into obscurantism, under the iron rule of the Sharia and its armed zealots. The university is destroyed, music is forbidden, stonings are
taking place in the middle of the street, and public executions in the national stadium open football matches: fear has seized the consciousness
and everyday lives of the citizens. And for all the women forced to be escorted to walk the city streets and condemned to stay hidden under the
traditional burqa with its grid at eye level, this life was synonymous with nothingness, male domination having taken crushing proportions in the
name of religion (and in the name of mass control). It is at the heart of this very dark period, which unfortunately is still being repeated across
the world and should always be denounced, that Algerian writer Yasmina Khadra had chosen to immerse herself, in her excellent best-selling
novel The Swallows of Kabul (published in 2002). The story is now turned into a very good animated film, The Swallows of Kabul [+], directed
by French filmmakers Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbe-Mevellec, and presented in Un Certain Regard at the 72nd Cannes Film Festival.
Intelligently adapted by Sébastien Tavel, Patricia Mortagne and Zabou Breitman, the story crosses the paths of three main characters: former
moudjahidine Atiq, turned guard of the local prison after having fought for years against the Soviets; and a young couple composed of
unemployed school teachers Mohsen, who carries a profound depression (feeling his own values being dangerously sucked in by the context),
and Zunaira, a very beautiful woman longing for freedom. Around them, a myriad of secondary characters gravitates: Mussarat, Atiq’s wife, sick
with terminal cancer (and whom Atiq should repudiate, according to an insistent former colleague of the prison guard); Quassim, the merciless
chief of the vice squad; Arash, a professor who has opened a clandestine school; a former mullah dreaming of escape, etc. A fatal incident
after a fight pushes Zunaira in Atiq’s prison and, like a thunderbolt, turns the latter’s life upside down. But the young woman’s execution is
looming, and the oppressors are watching for any slipup…
How to keep the hope and the desire to live in a mortiferous environment, in an open sky prison system where women in particular occupy
the worst of all submissive positions? Shaping a film whose soft graphics help address dramatic events head on and without too much
psychological violence done on the viewer, the two directors get the most out of a simple but perfectly articulated story. As it calmly weaves
together all the threads of the composition (topics such as couplehood, love, former fighters, integrity, human weaknesses, and glimmers of
hope under a dictatorial sky, among others), the film always respects the rules necessary for a kind of suspense. The Swallows of Kabul is an
aesthetically and narratively beautiful example of the affecting power of essential, humanist, and feminist ideas that auteur animation offers,
and which can reach broader audiences of both adult and younger viewers.
https://www.cineuropa.org/en/newsdetail/372652
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 10Roger Ebert, USA
May 16th, 2019
Barbara Scharres,
Life in Afghanistan under the Taliban is a subject that has been addressed in the past in a feature-length animated film, Oscar-nominated “The
Breadwinner.” Today, the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes festival premiered “The Swallows of Kabul,” by Zabou Breitman and Elea
Gobbe-Mevellec, an animated film in which the fates of two couples in 1998 Kabul become linked through accident and tragedy. While “The
Breadwinner,” the story of a plucky little girl saving her dad, was a film for the whole family, “The Swallows of Kabul,” is most definitely designed
for an adult audience.
The hand-drawn animation has the pleasing, muted appearance of watercolor painting, and is exceptionally detailed and subtly shaded,
providing a greater than usual realism in its depiction of city settings. The content is disturbing and morally complex, treating subjects like sex,
love, and temptation.
Young liberal-minded married teacher Mohsen is on his way home when he encounters the stoning execution of a woman being staged in
the street. The men in the crowd heave their heavy rocks with gusto, and even little kids on the sidelines giggle and try to toss a few. Mohsen
picks up a stone and reluctantly throws it. When the crowd disperses and the body is unceremoniously hauled away, he is left stunned with
regret and shame.
His wife Zunaira, an artist and a sprightly beautiful woman, is at home working on a wall mural and tapping her foot to rap music. Mohsen
returns, and their lovers’ quarrel ends with lovemaking. A few days later, a frightening incident in the street results in Zunaira being publicly
punished by the Taliban for wearing the wrong shoes. Another more serious quarrel between husband and wife ensues, and Mohsen is killed
in a freak household accident. Zunaira is sent to prison for murder, and has been sentenced to die in the soccer stadium prior to the upcoming
game.
Meanwhile, “The Swallows of Kabul” has also introduced Atiq, a middle-aged guard in the prison for women on death row. He is childless and
a wounded war veteran, married late in life to a devoted wife who now has terminal cancer. He is a hard unemotional man who still expects
to be waited on by the ailing woman. His best friend tells him to ditch her. “No man owes anything to a woman,” he tells doubtful Atiq. “Find a
nice, healthy virgin and have kids.”
Zunaira ends up under Atiq’s custody as his sole condemned prisoner. Her beauty disturbs and arouses him when he accidentally catches the
sight of her without a burka. Religious taboos, guilt, lust and anger are churning in his conscience. He visits the deserted apartment of Zunaira
and Mohsen, and pulling back a wall curtain, confronts her mural – graphic drawings of the couple embracing, and Zunaira’s erotic nude self-
portrait. It is an outrage in his sight and a religious offense, but ultimately a catalyst for change as it works on his mind.
One of the many beauties of “The Swallows of Kabul” is that it portrays every central character as a complex human being capable of change.
A simple rant against Taliban evils would be easy and forgettable. This film threads an undying hope for the future through every shade of its
tragedy and sacrifice.
https://www.rogerebert.com/cannes/cannes-2019-bacurau-atlantique-the-swallows-of-kabul
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 11The Upcoming, UK
May 17th, 2019
Joseph Owen,
“We’ve already been killed, all of us. It happened so long ago, we’ve forgotten it.” So we’re told in Yasmina Khadra’s novel The Swallows of
Kabul, now adapted into animation by Eléa Gobbe Mevellec, whose narrative positions the unutterable bleakness of Taliban rule onto the
thwarted expectations of the academic class. Under systems of intolerance freedom is withheld: in the present and in memory. Tyranny
deadens autonomy, the self, the ability to fail and flourish.
Summer 1998, Kabul: religious authoritarians have destroyed universities, cinemas and any symbols of perceived cultural decadence.
Hypocrites enforce order while indulging in excesses for which they berate the population. Beautiful, educated Zunaira (Zita Hanrot) refuses
the burka, spending most of the time cloistered indoors, cast out like the dwindling likeminded.
An accident with her young husband Mohsen (Swann Arlaud), indirectly brought about by the society’s strict treatment of women, pushes her
towards execution. Mohsen is a bit of a dope, truthfully, although his complicity in misogynistic laws is suggestively depicted. The system enters
his biology: his arm moves without him and casts the stone, caught up in the barbarity of crowds. Atiq (Simon Abkarian), another wayward man
with good intentions, is a weathered sceptic. His wife is dying of cancer and he’s rendered quiet.
Mevellec’s animations are austere but effective. The lack of colour reflects the arid environs. It both produces a form of distance and allows for
shocking violence. Deaths are bloody and candid, offering a potency and respect perhaps impossible in live action. The finale is brutal and
lucid, tempered by a possible cultural resistance. Testosterone, opportunism and hatred fuel the antagonists.
There are incurious moments that treat learnedness and belief in liberty as inherently and always valuable. Hope doesn’t face sufficient critique
– it is never considered morally ambiguous. False aspirations aren’t viewed as pernicious, posed against the Taliban’s obvious malevolence.
Redemption can’t be always found in the university.
In this way the dialogue tends to abstraction: freedom, possibility, the future. It’s no clearer in 2019 whether the swallows have reclaimed or
secured the rights gestured here. The film reaffirms the commitment to liberalism’s ideals in the wake of misery and despair, then and now. But
the sacrifices linger; the pictures don’t flinch. From the particular, horrors are made universal and transcendent. No wonder we are all grieving.
https://www.theupcoming.co.uk/2019/05/16/cannes-film-festival-2019-the-swallows-of-kabul-les-hirondelles-de-kaboul-review/
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 12Another Gaze, UK
May 20th, 2019
Bessie Rubenstein
In their adaption of Yasmina Kadra’s novel The Swallows of Kabul (2002), director/actress Zabou Breitman and animator Eléa Gobbé Mévellec
have pulled each other into new territory: the former had never worked in animation and the latter had never worked on a feature film. Mixing
their areas of expertise they filmed their actors performing scenes in full, costumed takes and then turned the frames into graphics which look
hand-painted, delicately watercoloured and outlined with bold ink strokes. The style suits the substance. Swallows, set during the Taliban’s five
year regime, grapples with the ability to live meaningfully when self-expression is never without fear. Art, in all forms, has been forbidden. The
film concentrates on two couples: Mohsen and Zunaira, and Atiq and Musarrat. The former are younger, and in search of joy while the latter,
older and more cynical, try to live with the near certainty that joy cannot be found.
Mohsen and Zunaira do not cling to the fragments of their liberated lives as much as they carry them gently in their pockets. Mohsen, a
historian, strolls through his former university and stares at the bullet shells that litter its rooms. (In one moment of heavy-handed symbolism,
he dwells on two golden casings resting on an open text book). Meanwhile Zunaira, a painter, disengages with her oppressive community so
entirely that she does not even own the necessary burqa that would allow her to venture outside. Her daily routine consists of transgressions
against the Taliban – painting on the walls of their flat, listening to music – which send women scuttling past her window which leaks bass, for
fear of mere association. In spite of restrictions, Mohsen and Zunaira retain some level of passion: Mohsen for Zunaira, and Zunaira for Mohsen
and their future. She is fierce in her belief that the latter still exists unchanged from its original conception. “One must live,” she tells Mohsen,
eyes burning as much as it is possible for sketched eyes to burn.
And Mohsen does, for Zunaira, but the impoverishment of education outside of propaganda, the bursts of gunfire, and the daily cries of
the wretched outside the Taliban-occupied hospital, change him as they change Kabul. After visiting the wreckage of his own university,
he happens upon – or is drawn to – the public stoning of a prostitute. We can’t see the woman’s face underneath her burqa, but we hear
her laboured breathing. What we do see is the entire stoning, which is perhaps only possible for an audience to bear because it is drawn.
Mohsen watches the crowd toss rocks at the woman before picking up the last stone in the pile and throwing it himself. Is he performing,
caught up in the spectacle? Does he at all believe that this woman deserves to “die as she lived” – in disgrace – as the man announcing her
execution has proclaimed? Or is he transferring his frustration, expressing misery through violence for which he knows there will be no societal
consequence? We don’t know because Mohsen doesn’t know. Engaging with institutionalised, gendered violence, even without conviction,
still stains. Later, as Zunaira washes Mohsen’s feet, he imagines the water turning to blood.
If Mohsen and Zunaira show us the hardships of more traditional resistance, Atiq and Musarrat show us the agony of compliance. Tender
moments do not exist for Atiq, a prison guard, and his terminally ill wife Musarrat, who is bothered far less by her physical pain than the spiritual
pain of failing to make Atiq happy and therefore failing to “fulfill her duties as a wife”, as she tells him miserably. Musarrat’s devotion is a foil for
Zunaira’s commitment to retaining her autonomy: hert womanhood and personhood pivot on her domestic abilities, as the Taliban dictates
they should. Swallows as a film reduces Musarrat to despondent patheticisms. Khadra’s novel contextualises Musarrat’s insistence on doing
housework by making clear that this is her way of retaining her dignity. The film strips this away. By concentrating on her subservience, now
seemingly only ideological, the film opts for a portrayal which works dramatically but one-dimensionally. One evening, she ignores Atiq’s
inquiry about her pain by pointing out that she cooked and tidied up. Atiq’s friends, too, scold him for his emotional reaction to her. “No man
owes anything to a woman,” they tell him, and the distance between them, knotted with duty, remains.
In the end, what Breitman and Mévellec tell us is that there is no way to exist undamaged under this kind of oppression, and that extends to
the men who “benefit” from it and those, like Zunaira, who try to live outside of it. Like Mohsen, she is led to an act that would be unbelievable
were it not for this and the film’s consistent use of hypersymbolism. When Zunaira is sent to Atiq’s prison to await execution he falls in love
with her at first sight. We get the sense that we’re meant to cheer Atiq on, but there’s something diminishing about the fact that his protective
impulse comes from a single look, although his motivation later becomes less flimsy. The film’s more interesting celebration, though, is that of
Musarrat’s final sacrifice for Atiq. She switches places with Zunaira and takes the bullet meant for her. The crowd of covered women who are
watching suddenly scatter and turn into swallows flying, free, through the air. This is beautiful, but I wonder about the message. The final image
of female liberation in the film follows a sacrifice ultimately made for the sake of a man and his attraction to another woman.
http://www.anothergaze.com/swallows-kabul-les-hirondelles-de-kaboul-takes-rosy-look-female-sacrifice-cannes-feminist/
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 13Film Inquiry
May 18th, 2019
Alistair Ryder
Adapted from Yasmina Khadra’s best seller, The Swallows of Kabul vividly captures the horror of life under Sharia Law, packing such a
visceral punch in its drama that it’s often easy to forget you’re watching a beautiful work of hand drawn animation. For those who saw The
Breadwinner, the similarly themed animation from Irish studio Cartoon Saloon, it’s easy to see why this material may feel too familiar and suffer
in comparison, even if it is adapted from a well known source of its own. Thankfully, co-directors Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec
aren’t trying to tone down the nature of the horrors to appease a potential younger audience, and from the opening moments bluntly depict
the harrowing realities of life under Taliban rule.
For those not familiar with the source material, the story is simple; in the late 90’s, in the capital of Afghanistan, the Taliban have come to power
and nobody knows what the future holds. Mohsen (voiced by Swann Arlaud) and his wife Zunaira (Zita Hanrot) hold on to the naive belief that
things can get back to how they were, but circumstances have changed dramatically – rules pervade every inch of their daily lives, that causes
fractures in their happy coupledom. Zunaira is eventually imprisoned and sentenced to a public execution, but while behind bars she catches
the eye of prison warden Atiq (Simon Abkarian). He slowly becomes obsessed with the weak justifications he’s given as to why she deserves
the death penalty and decides to quietly take matters into his own hands.
One of the film’s most arresting images takes place in the opening moments; a woman being stoned to death by braying crowds, a laughing
child among those throwing rocks, the blood pooling out of the material as she finally collapses. The horrors of life under such an authoritarian
regime are all vividly captured, created to make the audience wince as much as they would in a live action film within the same setting. The film
also has echoes of a ghost story outside of its haunting, blunt-force violence, as the characters haunted by a past they can no longer retreat
to; the burnt out school and town landmarks like the abandoned cinema appear like artefacts from a distant history that can no longer be
repeated once society loses its innocence.
The Swallows of Kabul is a haunting, harrowing drama – beautifully hand drawn, and yet so unflinching in the horrors it portrays, you might
start forgetting this is a mere animated feature.
https://www.filminquiry.com/cannes-report-2/
- THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL - CANNES UCR 2019 - Press Wrap
Page 14Goombastomp.com
May 16th, 2019
James Slaymaker
Co-directors Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévell find a neat way to adapt Yasmina Khadra’s 2002 novel to the visual language of cinema
in The Swallows of Kabul, rendering the film in 2D hand-drawn animation that mimics the style of watercolour painting. I say “neat,” rather
than “ingenuous” or “beautiful,” because I was left with the feeling that they could have been more experimental with the format. According to
Breitman and Gobbé-Mévell, the performers were recorded enacting every scene, and these recordings were then painstakingly studied by
the animators to heighten the sense of realism, as well as catch every minute detail of facial expression and body language. An impressive feat,
no doubt, but this fidelity to perceptual realism neuters the potential of the medium.
There is a fantastic moment towards the end of the narrative, in which an overhead wide shot of a man walking with a firearm gradually
dissolves to white, with the background fading out bit-by-bit until the character is a single, solitary figure on a plain canvas; the man is then
abstracted into a black inkblot, which morphs into a flock of birds soaring across the screen. This transition is honestly breath-taking, and it
hints at the great film The Swallows of Kabul may have been. Unfortunately, the vibrancy of its images are mostly subsumed to the strict codes
of the continuity style that conventional narrative cinema is founded upon: lots of dialogue-driven scenes in which characters discuss themes
while being captured in inexpressive shot-reverse-shots. By privileging verbal exposition over visual expression, the filmmakers rarely give their
images space to truly breathe; this is a pity, as they are able to craft a number of truly striking silent sequences. A single shot of a row of nooses
lightly swaying in the centre of a football stadium packs more of an emotional punch than any of the scenes of traditional melodrama.
Luckily, Breitman and Gobbé-Mévell are working from undeniably powerful source material. Set in a Kabul struggling under oppressive Taliban
rule, The Swallows of Kabul paints a nuanced, balanced vision of a conflict that is too often treated in over-simplified, hysteric terms. The
Taliban are not simply portrayed as heinous, mindless villains; their agenda is contextualized within the wider sphere of global geo-politics.
Also, the citizens living under their control are not passive victims, but a lively community of creative individuals — some of whom have given
over to the enforced repression and given up hope, while others engage in acts of resistance to varying degrees of severity.
Mohsen (Swann Arlaud) and Zunaira (Zita Hanrot) are a young married couple who long to return to teaching History and Art, but the Taliban
forcibly deny their freedom to teach their own material. The two’s perception of themselves as idealistic progressives eager to fight for liberty
is complicated when Mohsen feels compelled to throw a rock at a prostitute during a public stoning. Mohsen carries the guilt of that single
action throughout the rest of the narrative, questioning to what extent he’s come to internalize the dominant, misogynistic ideology of the violent
fundamentalists who govern so much of his life. This shame leads to him to increasingly distance himself from Zunaira, causing a substantial
rift in their seemingly ideal relationship.
In parallel to this, there is the marriage of a much older couple, Atiq (Abkarian) and Mussarat (Hiram Abbass). He proposed to her when she
was already considered a washed-up spinster by his friends, and she still encourages him to divorce her for a younger woman. When her
cancer is revealed to be incurable, Atiq can’t help but feel a sense of relief, as he begins to scope out potential replacements. Each character is
affected in various ways by the tyranny of Taliban rule, and The Swallows of Kabul details with a great deal of sophistication the various forms
that this abuse can take, from the explicit methods of public executions used to keep citizens in line, to the strict regulation of educational
programmes to morph the ideology of the upcoming generation to accept their actions passively.
The two couples make for a pointed contrast: the older pair have settled into a life of quiet resignation, while the younger characters are fiery
and defiant. It is a testament to the film’s skill that it never shies away from portraying the horrifying extent of the Taliban’s barbarianism while
still ending on a note of hope. Despite my misgivings with The Swallows of Kabul, this introduction of uplift into the otherwise overwhelmingly
bleak narrative genuinely floored me — it’s easily one of the most moving moments I’ve seen in a film this year.
https://www.goombastomp.com/cannes-swallows-of-kabul-review/
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Page 15DMovies, UK
May 16th, 2019
Victor Fraga,
French animation follows two young lovers in Taliban-occupied Kabul,
portraying life under the oppressive regime in a colourful yet frank
light
Everyone is fallible. Jesus taught us in the Bible: “He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone at her”. The Swallows of Kabul
does not allude to Christianism. After all, this is Afghanistan under the control of Muslim fundamentalists. Yet it does seem to take Jesus’s
teaching quite literally. Mohsen (voiced by French heartthrob Swann Arlaud) reluctantly throws a rock at a female being stoned to death at
a public square in the Afghani capital, carrying the capital punishment for an undisclosed offence. He isn’t alone. An angry crowd of men,
women and even children throw stones at the woman until she fatally collapses. “She lived in disgrace, so she shall also die in disgrace”, a
government official announces. Later, Mohsen comes to regret his action.
Set in 1998, The Swallows of Kabul rescues fragments of humanity and kindness in the most unlikely places. Despite having thrown a stone,
Mohsen is not a monster. He is profoundly in love with his wife Zunaira (Rita Hanrot), and capable of selfless actions in name of his beloved
spouse. Meanwhile, prison ward Atiq (Simon Abkarian) is struggling to cope with his wife’s terminal illness. He’s advised to ditch her in favour
of a young and healthy female who could bear his children. He doesn’t know what to do. He’s not a monster, either.
Based on the eponymous novel by Libyan writer Yasmina Khadra and directed by two females, The Swallows of Kabul is a very feminine
endeavour in its gentle candour and colourful sensibility. Violence is neither fetishised nor sanitised. The blood is seen as it soaks the burka,
yet the fatal wounds are never graphically depicted. The directors portray a regime that relentless and sadistically castigates females. Women
are less worthy than men.
Yet men are not portrayed as beasts. Mohsen and Atiq are both struggling to reconcile their humanity with the regime’s perverse doctrine. Until
one day tragedy strikes and their paths cross. Atiq’s humanity is rekindled by a single tear in his eye, his wife notes. The movie wraps up with
the ultimate sacrifice, a testament that altruism can survive even under the most arid and inhospitable conditions.
Despite being set in Afghanistan, The Swallows of Kabul is a very French film. It’s entirely spoken in French (Khadra’s original novel was
also written in French). At times, the animated images look like a Belle Époque painting, the glam and glitz of Paris replaced by the derelict
buildings of war-torn Afghanistan. A welcome addition to the small pool of animated war movies made by women, which includes the also
French Persepolis (Marjane Satrapi/ Vincent Paronnaud, 2007) and the Irish-American The Breadwinner (Nora Twomey, 2018). Worth a watch.
https://www.dmovies.org/2019/05/16/the-swallows-of-kabul-les-hirondelles-de-kaboul/
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Page 16Eye For Film, UK
May 16th, 2019
Richard Mowe,
„Visually arresting and emotionally engaging.“ | Photo: © Les Armateurs - Mélusine Productions - Close Up Films - ARTE France Cinéma - R
It is a highly original notion to make an animated film about a tough story of Taliban oppression, in human values and creative freedoms.
Perhaps against the odds, it works, with the water-colour palette of co-drector Eéa Gobbé-Mévellec providing a counterpoint to the harshness
of the universe around.
This is the first time that renowned French theatre and film director (and actress) Zabou Breitman has attempted to work in animation, teaming
up with talented artist Gobbé-Mévellec.
Copy picture
Originally, the idea was to make the story as piece of live action but it became clear that the difficulties of such a project would get in the way.
Animation clearly allows the makers a greater of freedom and expression and could also make the narrative more palatable to viewers, leaving
plenty of room for imaginations to take flight.
The narrative examines the lives of Mosheen and his beautiful wife, Zunaira, which are destroyed as the Taliban takes over. Mosheen‘s dream
of becoming a diplomat has been shattered and Zunaira can no longer even appear on the streets of Kabul unveiled.
Atiq is a jailer who guards those who have been condemned to death; the darkness of prison and the wretchedness of his job have seeped
into his soul.
Atiq‘s wife, Musarrat, is suffering from an illness no doctor can cure. The destinies are about to become inexplicably intertwined, through death
and imprisonment to passion and extraordinary self-sacrifice.
The film was shot with the voice actors dressed in costume and in the studio - including Hiam Abbass, Zita Hanrot, Swann Arlaud, and Simon
Abkarian. Breitman suggests that the process helped to give a sense of hyper-realism.
Whatever the means, it is both visually arresting and emotionally engaging.
https://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/the-swallows-of-kabul-2019-film-review-by-richard-mowe
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Page 17Film Companion, India
May 20th, 2019
Baradwaj Rangan,
Cannes 2019: Despite Clichés, The Earnestness
Of The Taliban-Era ‘The Swallows Of Kabul’ Is Affecting
When we see the world through the mesh screen on the burqa, it’s like looking out through prison bars. And we realise how heavy the garment
is.
The Swallows of Kabul is an animated feature about life under the Taliban (based on a book by Yasmina Khadra), and the opening scenes
have the suffocating quality of metaphoritis. You’ll know what I mean when you see the “poetic” visual of a bird being shot to the ground, with
the shooters in a Jeep hooting and hollering, pumping the air with their machine guns. Here’s another scene meant to make you ache. We see
a movie theatre, all lit up and colourful, and three people step out in Western clothes — DISSOLVE TO the same theatre, now looking bombed
out, with the same three people now attired in traditional, head-to-toe attire. For a while everything is too literal, a series of “see what happened”
placards. A middle-aged man whose wife is ailing is advised to “repudiate her”, and “find a nice, healthy virgin and have kids”. We cannot even
imagine what life must have been like under the Taliban, but narrative drama needs to be shaped and sculpted in order to differentiate it from
an eye-opening report in a daily. The “poetry” needs form.
But once the place-setting is done with, once the film (directed by Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec) becomes about its people, it
gets a lot better. We follow the lives of two couples, one liberal and one conservative. The latter, first. Atiq is that middle-aged man with the
ailing wife, Mussarat. He’s a jail warden, and he married Mussarat out of a sense of gratitude, when she saved his life. (She was a nurse.) And
the prospect of having to come home to her troubles, in addition to what he witnesses at work, is too much to bear. He says, “How can I deal
with others’ misery when I can’t even deal with mine?”
When Atiq’s superior sees that his sleeves are folded above the elbow, he orders him to lower them to the wrist. It’s a reminder that it’s not just
the women who were burdened with cruel sartorial rules. But they did have it worse, much worse. Swallows gives us POV shots from inside a
burqa. When we see the world through the mesh screen on the veil, it’s like looking out through prison bars. And I don’t recall an earlier film
that made us realise how heavy the garment is. When Zunaira is forced to stand barefoot in the sun, for the “sin” of PDA-ing with her boyfriend
Mohsenand for wearing white shoes, the front of her burqa dampens with sweat patches, and soon, rivulets of sweat flow down her arms,
down her fingers, which are the only visible body parts.
This is a “see what happened” placard, too — but it’s affecting because it comes after we have been introduced to Zunaira and Mohsen, and
after we have gotten to care for them. It’s woven into cause-effect drama and not just brandished before us. Mohsen and Zunaira are the other
couple, the liberal couple. They are passionate, and they are equals. When they make love, you see Zunaira straddling Mohsen — it’s a rare
image in this kind of setting. And later, we discover a nude drawing of Zunaira on the wall (hidden behind a curtain, naturally; this, too, needs
to be hidden under a veil). The emotion spills into their lines. After the public, post-PDA humiliation, Zunaira refuses to see Mohsen. “Your face
is my only sun,” he pleads. She replies, “No sun can rise at night.”
This “night” has enveloped everyone, even someone as kind and caring as Mohsen. In an early scene, when a woman is stoned in public for
the sin of fornication, one of the men who picks up a stone is Mohsen. But he’s different from the other men. We sense his hesitation, and
after the woman falls dead, we see his confusion and remorse. So why did he do it? Apparently, he didn’t. Later, he tells Zunaira, “My arm
did it.” Swallows is simplistic, predictable and feels like a moral-science fable — the last stretch involves a rescue that’s right out of Ruritanian
romance novels like The Prisoner of Zenda and I almost laughed. But I didn’t, because the film’s earnestness is ultimately touching. The
beautiful, watercolour-like animation helps. With real actors delivering real emotion, maybe it would all be too much, too familiar. This way, the
pain transforms into a different kind of art.l
https://www.filmcompanion.in/cannes-film-festival-2019-the-swallows-of-kabul-movie-review-baradwaj-rangan
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Page 18London Student, UK
May 18th, 2019
James Witherspoon,
Credit where credit’s due, The Swallows of Kabul is a beautifully made and emotionally devastating watercolour animation; a sobering lament
for the destruction of a majestic city and the culture that went with it. Although its storyline is slight and leans towards the melodramatic, its
short run-time and impressive artistic design ensure that the film is a compelling watch nonetheless – just don’t expect to leave the theatre
dry-eyed. Adapted from the novel of the same name by Yasmina Khadra, this tasteful and reserved animation is directed by Zabou Breitman
and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec.
We follow young, liberal couple Zunaira (Zita Hanrot) and Mohsen (Swann Arlaud), aspiring teachers forced into the conservative Islamic
regime of the Taliban in Kabul. Together, they cling to hope of escape or rebellion led by education, even as the forces that marshall around
them threaten to tear society apart at any moment. At times, they attempt to revisit their brighter past: the bombed out shell of a university where
they studied and met; the dilapidated cinema which once saw so much laughter; the rotting bookshop where many a romantic moment was
shared. In their place are stonings, sexism, and boredom.
In contrast, we follow a second couple – Atiq (Simon Abkarian), the city’s jailer, and Mussarat (Hiam Abbass), his terminally-ill wife. Lacking
in any optimism, Atiq and Mussarat stumble through their daily lives – something that’s apparent on their tired, sagging faces. The coming
together of these two opposing couples provides the narrative force of the brisk 81-minute film. Daylight meets dusk, youth meets old-age, and
tradition clashes with modernity.
To say that The Swallows of Kabul is a 1.5-hour barrage of death, oppression, and executions would only be a minor exaggeration – despite the
bright hearts burning at its core, the film’s tone reflects its dismal setting. In the last 20 minutes, particularly, the overwhelming tragedy reaches
levels that could be described as operatic: waiting in line to collect bags after the screening, scores of faces slick with tears emerged from the
Debussy. In this regard, it can feel a little exploitative: heavily melodramatic, manipulative, and ultimately rather slight on the political/story front.
But we know that not every film needs to be political, and not every film needs to have a wowing storyline. The Swallows of Kabul is a film about
anger, oppression, and ultimately hope – its narrative obscured by a tangible wave of emotion washing over the audience from the first frame to
the last. And what frames – the hand-painted watercolour animation of the film manages to be intricate and beautiful, without becoming showy
or distracting from the themes at its heart.
In a world where most ‘serious’ adult animation is heavily political, it’s refreshing to see something that appeals to the senses and heart rather
than the head. For sure, the film is sure to stoke anger and fears surrounding conservative Islamic regimes – but there’s nothing in here that we
didn’t already know to begin with. It can be easy to forget the individual human cost of large-scale political conflict, and Zabou Breitman and
Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec’s film forces us to confront a small portion of that reality, aiming to universalise the experience of a couple.
Although, in the end, The Swallows of Kabul may not be the most substantial or memorable offering at Cannes, it makes up for its shortcomings
in its experience: an intense, emotional journey from despair to, ultimately, hope.
4/5
http://londonstudent.coop/cannes-2019-the-swallows-of-kabul/
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Page 19High on Films , UK
May 18th, 2019
Freddie Kay
A short and ultimately not very sweet (well, it’s relatively depressing) feature-length animation set against the Taliban jurisdiction in Afghanistan,
The Swallows of Kabul (Les Hirondelles De Kaboul) is unfair, but almost entirely a hopeful reflection on pursuing truth in an atmosphere
conjured by lies.
We begin the film with the horrific stoning of a promiscuous woman, in Kabul what she does with her body is not within her control – she
is killed. It is the end of her story and the start of Mohsen’s, a history passionate individual who wants to teach the future generation of
Afghanistan along with his art obsessed wife, Zunaira. Mohsen is overcome with an urge to take part in this gruesome act and an immediate
wave of guilt rushes over him. He collapses to his knees. However, this is also not entirely his story – Atiq runs the prison the woman was taken
from, he is depressed, war-stricken and cares for his dying wife. Everything in Kabul seems lost. For now.
There was something special about the visual style here and it really carried a large portion of the storytelling, aside from some frames that
could’ve been more expressive, the washed watercolour aesthetic of this world is incredibly fitting. You can sense the pain in Atiq’s bold, heavy
eyes. The detail is simplistic but perfect. His narrative is probably the best in this 80-minute film, although, once Zunaira becomes the dogma
of an idea for freedom, I wished that the filmmakers had chosen a better path to skew her away from her secure lifestyle with Mohsen. There is
a moment which occurs, heartbreaking indeed, yet the execution could’ve carried a lot more in tone to the oppressing environment of Kabul
and the men who actually perpetuate it. A tragic accident it is, but not emotionally gripping to what occurs beforehand.
This is a slightly problematic film, pacing and investment-wise, but it does pursue honesty and hates the fact that love is being dismantled by
extremist regimes like Sharia Law. Also, it might just be worth seeing for one beautifully drawn transition from humans to swallows, and of
course anyone interested in foreign language animation will find this (at the very least) intriguing.
https://www.highonfilms.com/the-swallows-of-kabul-2019-cannes-review/
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Page 20Fimotomy , INTL
May 19th, 2019
ALLISON M
The Swallows of Kabul
This animated film isn’t for children. Focusing on those affected by Sharia law, it features a woman being stoned to death and other acts of
violence. The animation is okay: it’s sparse, but gets the job done. The ending is poetic.
I am a fan of Zabou Breitman, the co-director. Animation is an interesting choice, but ultimately was perhaps not the best way to tell the best
story. For something in a similar vein, I recommend The Stoning of Soraya M.
https://filmotomy.com/allison-in-cannes-2019-part-three-beanpole-the-swallows-of-kabul-a-white-white-
day/
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Page 21rtve, Spain
May 16th, 2019
Esteban Ramon,
‚Les hirondelles de Kaboul‘, una joya animada sobre el imperio del burka
La película sobre el aplastamiento moral de los afganos emociona en el festival
Si algo gusta al Festival de Cannes es el exotismo. La sección oficial proyectaba Atlantique, de la cineasta francio-senegalesa Mati Diop, una
sencilla historia de amor juvenil con aire fantástico y el trasfondo de los migrantes que se lanzan en pateras buscando España y el primer
mundo. Una crítica social portagonizada por las ‚penélopes‘ que pierden a sus maridos en el océano que no parece una candidata a la Palma
de Oro y que supone un hito para la joven realizadora de 36 años.
Para todos los públicosMati Diop, la primer mujer negra que compite por la Palma de Oro en Cannesreproducir video01.27 min
Mati Diop, la primer mujer negra que compite por la Palma de Oro en Cannes
Pero una pequeña joya de la jornada estaba en la sección Una cierta mirada. Les Hirondelles de Kaboul (Las golondrinas de Kabul), un trabajo
de animación –hay realidades a las que sienta bien una mediación estética- que adapta una novela de Yasmina Khadra, y que ha dejado la
sala Debussy de Cannes sin aliento.
Codirigida por la también actriz Zabou Breitman y Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec (Ernest & Celestine), Les Hirondelles de Kaboul muestra la derrota
moral de aquellos afganos aplastados por el terror talibán. Ciudadanos que respiraron cierta libertad y tuvieron que amoldarse al asfixiante
sistema totalitario que nació tras la guerra afgano-rusa.
Les Hirondelles de Kaboul es la historia de dos parejas, una moderna y otra tradicional, en el imperio del burka. Los hombres tienen que
conciliar el amor a sus mujeres con un estado que les ordena despreciarlas. El más progresista experimenta un proceso de conformismo con
la sociedad, el otro abrirá los ojos. Porque el auténtico horror lo viven las dos mujeres que solo existen en la privacidad solitaria del hogar.
La película nació como un proyecto de acción real, pero se recondujo a una animación 2D en la que siempre se puede apreciar el gramaje
rugoso de un papel de fondo. Una animación clara, limpia, llena de ocres, que no funcionaría sin el realismo del sonido que le acompaña.
La película recuerda a Persépolis, que comparte el retrato del advenimiento de un régimen aniquilador. Pero hasta la revolución islámica iraní
parece un juego de niños en la comparación con el estado talibán, sempiterno recuerdo de que las sociedades humanas pueden tomar las
formas más perversas. La angustia de los personajes y la trama que deriva en thriller funcionan a la perfección en una película que viajará
por muchas salas del mundo.
http://www.rtve.es/noticias/20190516/les-hirondelles-kaboul-joya-animada-sobre-imperio-del-burka/1939940.shtml
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Page 22Caiman Ediciones, Spain
May 15th, 2019
Carlos F. Heredero, Angel Quintana, Juanma Ruiz
La novela Les Hirondelles de Kaboul forma parte de una trilogía, completada por L’Attentat y Les Sirènes de Bagdg,centrada en la lucha de la
mujer en el mundo islámico. Fue escrita por Yasmina Khadra y apareció en una versión ilustrada por Emmanuel Michel. A partir del material
original, dos otras mujeres Zabou Breitman y Eléa Gobbé Mévellec han articulado un cuento animado, pensado como un relato sobre la
conciencia de la culpa, la redención y la lucha por la libertad. El espacio de la acción es Kaboul en plena dictadura de los talibanes. En una
plaza una mujer es dilapidada y un joven tira una piedra. Este hecho desencadena una serie de oscilaciones en torno a cuatro personajes
–dos hombres y dos mujeres– que llevarán a cabo un camino de transformación en medio de una sociedad marcada por la represión, la
injusticia, la intolerancia y la represión contra la mujer. El film muestra el lado más sórdido del integrismo islámico pero lo hace a partir de
una poética singular. No puede evitar un cierto maniqueismo y cierto simplismo en su ejecución dramática. Sin embargo, los fondos de la
animación realizados con acuarela y los trazos simples convierten el cuento en una reflexión sobre el camino que puede llevar a los seres
humanos a ser otros, a romper con unos prejuicios heredados injustamente y a abrazar una lucha secular por la libertad. Àngel Quintana
Lo primero que llama la atención de Les Hirondelles de Kaboul es su bellísimo apartado visual; el aspecto de acuarela y la cálida textura
de sus imágenes, así como el diestro manejo de la luz en el dibujo animado. Cabe preguntarse, sin embargo, si esta opción estética era la
más adecuada para armar un relato sobre el Afganistán controlado por los talibanes que, entre otras atrocidades, pone su énfasis en varias
ejecuciones públicas. La historia de dos matrimonios afganos en Kabul adolece, además, de un esquematismo en su evolución y diálogos
que acaba por convertir al film de Breitman y Gobbé-Mevellec en una suerte de ‘el régimen talibán explicado para los niños’ o, en sus peores
momentos, en un discurso que parece salido de la pluma de algún escritor de autoayuda de la escuela Paulo Coelho. Una serie de lastres
que, en definitiva, quizá supongan un buen augurio ante un jurado presidido por la directora de aquella pieza de miserabilismo infame que
era Cafarnaúm. Juanma Ruiz
Adaptación de un cómic de Yasmina Khadra, del que se han vendido ya 600.000 ejemplares desde 2002, esta historia que se desarrolla en
el Afganistán de 1998, bajo la barbarie de los talibanes, se despliega en la pantalla dentro de un film de animación construido sobre un tapiz
de acuarelas que confiere a sus imágenes una pátina estética especialmente tamizada y que interactúa de manera eficaz con la extrema
sencillez de los escasos rasgos animados. El relato nos habla de la tiranía cultural y política del régimen fundamentalista, de la esclavitud que
sufren las mujeres y, más en concreto, de la toma de conciencia de un soldado talibán frente a la injusticia flagrante de las autoridades y frente
a la hipocresía insoportable de sus servidores. La dramaturgia de la propuesta y el sustrato dramático puesto en juego son ciertamente muy
elementales, y también algo maniqueos, por mucho que sus buenas intenciones se hagan explícitas desde el primer momento. El balance
final es una obra pequeña, pero estimable, más sensible y más matizada en sus formas y en las pinceladas de su animación que en sus
contenidos, demasiado evidentes. Carlos F. Heredero
https://www.caimanediciones.es/cannes-2019/
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