London River

source: London River

What worked: performance by the lead actors amazing screenplay and storytelling; minute details about the characters and the scenes are taken into attention and well done What didn't work: -the ending was as expected but i think few more scenes could have made it better the title of the movie is ambiguous to me;maybe it's metaphorical I was not so sure about the title Final verdict: Recommended

London River came to my attention while streaming English films on my tv service. I loved it, although sad, and it brought a new awareness to the experience of London's 7/7 terror attacks. The acting was excellent - kudos to all in the movie. My question regards the title - Why is it called London River? It would help me to know. I'm thinking - because some of the scenes were taken underground? Or under the river? Thank you if you can help.

London itself is foreign to Elizabeth (Blethyn), let alone the area where her daughter lived, starting with the halal butcher who owns the flat (Roschdy Zem), the kind bearded man who helps her with her phone. Add her growing personal anxiety and London in shock, and the pace is set for mounting grief and anguish. This anchored woman with property represents the diametric opposite of the lanky ageing Ousmane (Sotigui Kouyaté), who lives a quasi-nomadic life, for years far from home working in France, searching for himself perhaps (remissions of remote workers in Europe are how many families survive back home), just as Elizabeth has found herself amid her lettuces and donkeys in Guernsey. Great to see Sami Bouajila again (as the imam in London), he has aged gracefully. Typical of Islam how the youngish imam calls the towering world-weary Senegalese grandfather "my brother". Respect and affection have many faces, and in this case a discipline that eludes many of the Christian faith. In my house hardworking youths from Mali Senegal Guinea and Gambia pray to Allah separately, each with their own method, but the quiet dignity is palpable. As for Elizabeth and Ousmane, lives overlap often unbeknownst to us. The person you have loved now for a decade may have sat opposite you on the bus when you were both teenagers, without your knowing, or served you at the local café. Later the strands of that tapestry of life may reconnect, who knows (photos of missing loved ones taped to walls). With his stick, trying to navigate the panic and bureaucracy of the overloaded hospitals, Ousmane finds solace in walking through the park and stops to "greet" a mock orange in full bloom (he's a forester by profession), breathing in its fragrance. And at nightfall he finds an African-run café, sitting in silence with his tea and watching a confused and confusing world rush by outside the window. The next day he bumps into the imam again who has made inquiries and shows him the photo of the son Ali he last saw at 6 years old. Imagine the feelings of seeing that young face so full of life, and also the fear of being dismissed as obsolete by this youth with his European schooling and career promise. When she finally meets Ali's father, Elizabeth won't even shake the hand he so gracefully offers. Fear of the Other and the unknown is nothing new for him, and he shrugs off her diffidence and responds with infinite patience and even tenderness toward her, seeing her as a parent like himself. She calls the police on this tired old man with the idea that the son might have some involvement in the bombings, and the interrogation presumes the boy is jihadi. We should remember the total chaos and panic in the aftermath of the bombings, the frenetic search for clues, and the possibility of further bombings. In such conditions our suspicion of everything alien to our narrow lives escalates. And so on: the halal butcher who minds his own business just to survive, the islamic police investigator who struggles with his mandate to hassle Muslims. If you deign to see this story, please watch very closely, there are so many subtle touches, including the first time Ousmane comforts Elizabeth with his hand on hers in the travel agency (1:10:20), a gesture extremely rare for a Muslim man. Bouchareb's film is an essay in (in)tolerance. The surge of joy that their children might be holidaying in France segues into the cold corridor of grief at the truth. Momentarily united in hope, suddenly distanced by grief. Impeccable acting on all fronts. No Anniston and Pitt here, just faces in close-up that show the lines of age and real suffering that is life itself. The cinema world will miss Kouyaté's towering majesty.

STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning Elisabeth (Brenda Blethyn) lives a reclusive life on the shores of Guernsey, until her life is torn apart when she learns of the July 7th terror attacks in London, where her daughter lives. Meanwhile, Ousmane (Sotigui Kouyate) is a black Muslim immigrant from France who has also come to London to look for his son, who he has not seen from birth. When he discovers a photo and some contact details, he gets in touch with Elisabeth and they embark on a soul shattering quest to find their flesh and blood that takes them on a journey of discovery and hope, to the gravest depths of despair. In the extras section of the DVD, even Blethyn herself comments on doubts she had about accepting the script for London River, on account of how close it was to the attacks and the official enquiry etc. not coming out. But it's good that she pushed her doubts aside, because her performance is one of the more compelling things about this old fashioned feeling drama, tending to headlines from very recently. With the feel of some TV drama from the early 90s, director Rachid Bouchareb has laced his daring and challenging drama with some personal touches here and there that give it a neat feel of it's own. The execution never hits with it's maximum impact, and it's over too quickly to really make it shine. But the subtle, under-stated performances from the two lead actors and it's realistic feel of a tragedy and the cruelty of life unfolding lift it well above average. ***

By coincidence I got to see this film on a 9/11. I have not seen any of the previous films of Rachid Bouchareb, but I heard a lot about 'Indigenes' and I liked 'Flanders' that he produced. This film is quite low tone, but emotional and direct. In the aftermath of the terror attacks in London two parents look for their children. She is an English farmer widower from a remote island, he is from Africa, a Muslim and guest worker in France. Everything separates the two at first sight - religion, language, race and especially prejudice. They will get together because of the shared fate of their children, and they will go together through the painful phases of inquietude, fear, hope, and despair. They get to know each other, but this does not prevent destiny to hit them. I liked the fact that the film does not try to soften in anyway their paths, and avoided some of the traps that other types of endings or intrigues place in similar movies. Multicultural London filmed in a neutral and yet familiar way is the perfect background of the story that includes some racial tensions elements without insisting too much on them. Without avoiding completely simplification and a feeling of expected this direct approach plays quite well, and is immensely helped by the great acting of the two lead characters, especially Sotigui Kouyaté. This is not the ultimate film about the events that shattered London in July 2005, but rather a simple story about how usual people get are impacted by such events, an efficient and direct movie even if not great cinema.

This was a captivating, true to life experience from the outset. The actors were outstanding and the writing rang with authenticity. Terrific film.

This movie is a gentle and deep melodrama using the July 2005 terrorist acts as a jumping off point for telling about clashing cultures united in grief. The story is certainly a hard look at racial biases and is strongly backed by Blethyn's character, whose repressed hysteria clashes with Kouyaté's attitude (more similar to a calm resignation). The director has also depicted a very serious and fascinating study on how Londoners were unprepared to react to such an emergency. Overall this is a poignant and insight-filled take on prejudice in post-11/7 London, well acted and directed. There have been other "Londoner" films about the same subject (or about terrorism in the UK) but this is the best by far in my opinion.

POSSIBLE SPOILERS Apart from genres that I don't much care for such as musicals and westerns (John Ford excepted) I don't really have any taboos about what I watch. I generally close my eyes when anyone is about to slash their wrists but that's a matter of personal squeamishness rather than taboo. Provided it has quality, I generally lap up the rest of the film, blood and all. There is however one type of film that I find suspect to the point of avoidance and that is the dramatised account of tragedies and disasters that are so near in time that it casts the viewer into the role of voyeur of people still experiencing tremendous personal grief. Films on 9/11 certainly fall into this category. My sole reason for watching "London River" which deals with the 2005 London terrorist attacks was to catch a performance by Brenda Blethyn, a British actress for whom I have a tremendous admiration. I can only say that my cinema going experience would have been that much the poorer, had I not made this decision, such is the power, sincerity and integrity of this highly charged work. Although the horrendous events of 7/7 are an integral part of the film, it touches on so much more in its presentation of two disparate characters drawn together in a common quest, she a farming widow living on Guernsey, he an African forestry worker from France. In the ordinary way their only remote point of contact, apart from language, would be their proximity to the land, but 7/7 has drawn them to a neighbourhood of North London in their anxiety to discover what might have happened to their children on that terrible day. Even before they meet we are made aware of the woman's deep seated mistrust of other cultures and everything Islamic in particular. Her unease and expressions of bigotry only intensify the more she comes to realise that her daughter may have been cohabiting with a Muslim. Ultimately it is the subtle way that a common tragedy can enable a dignified respect by two people for one another to come about that gives the last half hour of "London River" its tremendous poignancy. The farewell between cinema's possibly most unlikely couple is something very precious and unforgettable

Weeks after the terrorist attacks in London a mother calls her daughter, over and over again. She hasn't heard from her in a while and is getting more and more anxious about her, knowing she lived close to where the events took place. When she goes to London to find her she finds a man instead. A man who matches her in one important manner - he is searching for his son. The two of them continue their search together and slowly find out more about themselves and each other. Dark and dreary, depressing and painful. Sometimes people get together for entirely the wrong reason and this is one of these occasions. They connect rather well and play their stories out in a believable way. As they go through their daily routine it becomes all too painfully clear where it will all end - but the real pain of this film is that it ends too quickly. It runs for 87 minutes and could have used another 15 without having grown less intense. The shortness makes it feel a little rushed, but only a little. 9 out of 10 steps in the dark