Connoisseurs of the deadpan and the droll are invited to check out the Uruguayan sock factory movie. “A pint-size pleasure.” — NY Times
You know how the captain will go down with the boat when it’s not necessary? That was perhaps the thing that we really wanted to portray.
Screened as part of NZIFF 2005
Whisky 2004
Connoisseurs of the deadpan and the droll are invited to check out the Uruguayan sock factory movie. Jacobo is a 60-year-old bachelor who runs such a factory in Montevideo. When his more successful brother Herman comes to visit, Jacobo enlists his faithful employee, Marta, to pose as his wife. The solemn comedy of Aki Kaurismäki is an obvious inspiration, but the young co-directors establish their own distinctive Uruguayan breed of inhibited individual.
“The film is a model of precision and economy, from the scrupulous framing and editing to the dryly note-perfect performances. With little outward effort, the actors convey the repressed emotions beneath Jacobo’s knee-jerk gruffness, Marta’s indulgent forbearance, and Herman’s banal bluster. Desires and anxieties bubble up in all three during the period of enforced proximity, but inertia proves the most powerful force of all.” — Dennis Lim, Village Voice