If you can approach it merely as an oddity from Cannes — an aesthetic experiment whose primary triumph is that it exists at all — then it's actually pretty delightful. (It probably also helps to see it on the big screen.) Even its being mind-bogglingly offensive just adds to the dazzlement of "I can't believe this got made."
Viewed as a Best Picture front-runner, however, it's every bit as excruciating as you've heard. That Oscar voters "largely consider the movie…
When I first saw this movie, in my early 20s, I was eviscerated by its thunderous sadness. Revisiting it now, in my late 30s, I find its vision — of redemption through forgiveness and mutual understanding — to be warmly, movingly utopian.
An astonishing film about the utility — and limits — of activism and journalism in the face of relentless oppression.
And the kind of movie where, in the absence of a Q&A, the TIFF audience exits the theatre in stunned near-silence.
