Director: Hlynur Pálmason
Writer: Hlynur Pálmason
Stars: Saga Garðarsdóttir, Sverrir Guðnason, Ída Mekkín Hlynsdóttir, Grímur Hlynsson
Synopsis: Captures a year in the life of a family as the parents navigate their separation. Through intimate vignettes and strange occurrences, the film explores the complexities of family, love, and the impact of shared memories.
Icelandic filmmaker Hlynur Pálmason is no stranger to making wholly singular pieces of work, and his latest, The Love That Remains (Ástin sem eftir er), is no exception. I can’t recall the last time I felt so absorbed watching a film, even though I found the structure to be often at odds with the poignant message at the heart of the picture. The story is relatively simple, but Pálmason’s formal approach is anything but. Instead of chronologically recounting a year in the life of a family whose parents (played by Saga Garðarsdóttir and Sverrir Guðnason) are going through a separation, the Godland director portrays this twelve-month journey through fragmented memories.
Some are, of course, positive and loving; others are not as uplifting. Then there are the mundane, but funny slice-of-life sequences that recall the work of Yasujiro Ozu (Good Morning, in particular) and the esoteric, otherworldly bits that come out of nowhere and shock your soul into complete bewilderment. It’s a totally singular artistic object, and one that demands your attention even if Pálmason’s structure is more alienating than commercially crowd-pleasing. Many may not appreciate the way he frames his story, but anyone who consistently has memories flashed back in front of their very eyes in jumbled, often imprecise succession (so, essentially, everyone), it’s not hard to like what’s shown on screen.
Life is, after all, a collection of fleeting memories. We go through a day, and what’s in the past cannot be fixed. They’re only stored in our minds until our ultimate voyage. The way Pálmason captures these memories is the same way we think about our past in relation to the future. Our recollections rarely linger, and if they do, it’s always the worst – and most embarrassing – parts of our past we don’t want to relive. Maybe, just maybe, we’ll also remember some of our darkest actions that will haunt us in our worst nightmares and make us feel the brunt of our gestures. In that case, Pálmason stages a sequence that feels plucked straight out of Jean-Claude Lauzon’s Léolo (or my worst nightmares, you decide!), but to say anything about it would rob you of the pleasures of discovering this unique object for yourself.
What’s most impressive here, though, is how Pálmason’s visual language informs the viewer of the fractures that caused the family to eventually separate without them uttering many words. As (purposefully) disjointed as the movie could get, even its juxtapositions gave many of its jaw-dropping images (shot by Pálmason himself) intense meaning. The performances are also excellent, with Garðarsdóttir being a major highlight, conveying a litany of repressed emotions through only her eyes. The two children, played by Þorgils Hlynsson and Grímur Hlynsson, are nice comedic counterpoints to a story that isn’t necessarily purely comedic, but represents a year in the life of an ordinary family grappling with an uncertain future, none of whom are sure how it will be shaped.
It’s just a shame that, at the end of the day, the emotional attachment between the audience and the protagonists feels rather limited in scope because of the fragmented nature of the project. However, there’s no denying Pálmason’s imprint within world cinema, as an artist who continues to break the very foundations of the medium for the better, one project at a time, and forces all of us to think differently about how film – as a work of art – should operate and showcase what are the most profoundly human aspects in our lives. In a world that feels less human by the day, films like The Love That Remains are worth cherishing.
