Rue de la Source
film — Poland — 2008

7.0
"Rue de la Source" is the longer of the two films we received from our former couchsurfing guest Krzysztof Uminski. In this film Krzysztof is listed as screenwriter, while in the other one he also shares directing credits with Michal Grosz (who in Rue de la Source participates as an actor).
The action takes place in Nancy (a city in France known to me for the football club where Michel Platini rose to world-wide fame) where four different lonely characters meet in the hour between day and night. One of them is a late-night radio DJ who plays sad love songs on his show and tells the stories of his even sadder listeners. Suddenly he has found himself to be in the same situation as most of the people in his audience. Another one is a lesbian girl who is miserable in the relationship with her partner. The third one is a sad old man who`s only friend is his dog. And finally there is Tomek - a Polish hitchhiker on the way to surprise his girlfriend. Actually, unlike the rest of the characters, Tomek is not a sad, lonely and pathetic person (by the way - in Tomek I saw a lot of Krysztof himself).
The film leads to the characters meeting one another, and that was the weakest point of the film - it seemed slightly staged and happening only in order to sum the film up. Thus a happy ending was probably not absolutely required here. Otherwise I liked the way the film is shot, the characters are colorful enough (especially Marcel - the porn guy), and the whole atmosphere of the film is nice. Liene noted (by the way - she really enjoyed both of the short films) that to her impression the films too heavily relied on showing the characters smoking - not because of political correctness but because it just seemed to be too emphasised.
Right after watching both of Kryzstof`s films, I would have said that I liked "Rue de la Source" better than "Kitchen Dreams". Now, looking back at them, I`m not so sure anymore. Either they are on the same level, or "Kitchen Dreams" are slightly better, that`s really hard to say.
2009-09-17
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