So after a mini-spate of not-so-great movies, let's mix it up with one that I actually really appreciated.
May I present to you: "Cold War" (2018).
This film follows a love story, based upon Director Paweł Pawlikowski's parents, through multiple vignettes spanning years and nations. Pawlikowski described his parents as "[the] most interesting dramatic characters I've ever come across" who "were strong, wonderful people, but as a couple, they were a never-ending disaster." Shot in a beautiful and lush black-and-white reminiscent of "The White Ribbon" (2009), "Cold War" delivers on the promise of the real-life people that spurred its creation.
Impressively, the movie manages to capture the chaos and tortured emotion of this romance without driving you to dislike or disdain either of the characters. Contrary to Pawlikowski's characterization, these by no means appear to be wonderful people, but they are tough and they burn bright even as they ultimately fade away. Their fleeting moments of tenderness and the fervor with which they continually fight their way back to each other deeply humanize them even as those moments make it clear that their union is doomed.
It is a considerable feat for Pawlikowski to render these characters with such a loving touch, especially when you consider that the child who appears so briefly onscreen that you would miss him if you blinked is likely meant to represent the director himself. It's easy to imagine how far-from-ideal it would have been to be parented by two people who just couldn't figure out how to love each other peacefully, and how their failure to do so might have led to their child being overlooked collateral damage in the recurring catastrophe of their love and dissolution. Yet still, despite all of the resentment that Pawlikowski would be entitled to feel toward his parents, none of it arises to sour this lovely and affecting film.
I gave "Cold War" a 4.5.
{Heart}
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