Fugitive Pieces

It is the rare film that stays with you. You know what I mean. The type of thing that haunts your head with images and words that linger and slide past your defenses; snapshots that stick around and crop up in unexpected places. Fugitive Pieces is such a film, so lyrical and lovely and ripe with human experience that I found myself thinking of it as poetry. This is my favorite type of film - one that takes you to another facet of our humanity - and takes you there with all your senses.

Told largely in the fragmentary flashbacks of memory, this is the story of Jakob (Stephen Dillane)who at seven years old watches in terror as his parents are murdered by Nazis in occupied Poland. Jakob escapes to the woods where he is rescued by Athos (Rade Serbedzija)who successfully smuggles him out of Poland to Greece. Jakob is haunted by images of his sister being dragged away, but the war comes to an end and Athos packs them off to live in Canada - far from memories. Despite the love and dedication of his 'godfather' Jakob grows into a brilliant writer but a deeply lonely man as "living with ghosts requires solitude." But through the love of friends, themselves all in some ways victims of the war, Jakob finally makes peace with his ghosts and learns to love, and live, again.

Jeremy Podeswa delivers a masterful adaptation of Anne Michael's novel - beautifully framed and lovingly filmed. The acting is superb and subtle as well; I was particularly smitten with Serbedzija and his expressive eyes. This lovely film may well break your heart, but it demonstrates the ever remarkable ability of the human heart to heal. See more here.