Directed By Nacho Vigalondo
Starring – Henry Golding, Beatrice Granno, Aura Garrido
The Plot – Follows a reeling man (Golding) as he joins a sleep trial that allows him to rebuild his life with his girlfriend (Granno) who died in an accident through the use of lucid dreams.
Rated R for adult language
Daniela Forever Official Trailer
POSITIVES
Like his previous films, Vigalondo channels a variation of genres and tones to account for a hearty center at the film’s core, and as to where this intention would normally be met with hesitation to the film’s integrity, the shifts come naturally materialized as a result of the authentic awkwardness surmised from grief, leading to a relationship exploration that surprisingly uncovers more about the characters involved post-widowed, than it does during the heights of their blossoming love. As to where a film pertaining to grief could easily be summarized as a drama, there’s quite a lot of off-beat humor to the movie’s favor that helps to keep this from being a virtual wet blanket, yet earnest enough to keep its weirdness from getting too out of hand and erratic towards feeling like an entirely different film all-together, and while so many of Vigalondo’s films vary in concept and creative execution, they’re all tied together by the resiliency of the human spirit that forces the characters to confront their most painfully crippling truths, offering another personally insightful delve into the mind of a cinematic madman too honest and upfront to ever feel pretentious. Because of such, if I had to compare “Daniela Forever” to any film, it certainly feels like a descendent of “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”, not just because it pertains to a man’s coming to terms with the mortality and regrets of his own passed over relationship, but also the science-fiction angle to the movie’s plot, which is ingrained with just enough grounded science to account for the fantastical manifestations that it frequently summons, leading to some thought-provoking insight on the memorability of the mind that causes certain memories to flourish vividly, while others feel shrouded in a hazy cloud of incoherence. This exploration does lead to some surprises, mainly in the selfishly narcissistic tendencies of Golding’s protagonist, but also in the duality that we unavoidably and irresponsibly lend to those we love, causing people to see things in ways that they truly never were, all the while causing an existential dilemma between the darkly depressing reality and the invigoratingly luminous fantasy that make up his everyday routine. To articulate this breathlessly, Vigalondo channels the visionary within his decades-old experience, playing with aspect ratio’s, color grading, and film variation, all in the means of triggering an internalized disconnect from society that audiences can effortlessly immerse themselves, while experiencing some audaciously ambitious visuals that breed a big screen appeal to a film and plot that are so unapologetically independent. For instance, scenes taking place in the real world are given a desaturated Betamax texture with a claustrophobically boxed-in 4:3 aspect ratio, in order to mirror the character’s palpably overhanging grief and depression, and the dream world flourishes this vibrantly colorful widescreen presentation in 16:9 format, in order to reflect the comfortable control and content within the artificial dimensions that the character maintains in making the kind of relationship and memories that he wants to make. The transitions between these artistic intentions offer an easily accessible detectability for audiences to define where they’re at in the storytelling, throughout frequently abrupt transitions between world’s, but beyond that appraise elements of limitless possibilities to the latter world, which in turn garners some “Inception-like” sequences of sort that prove every cent of this minimized budget was exploited on the screen. Beyond all of this, the performance from Henry Golding is impactfully gut-wrenching in the frail and spontaneous state that he lends to losing the single most important person in his life, allowing Golding the opportunity to unload some legitimate acting chops that I haven’t seen until now from the charming leading man. Golding has always proven himself to be a charismatic gentleman of sort in movies he has elevated, but here he constantly taps into the tenderness, anguish, joy, and remorse that makes his character such a wildly irresponsible protagonist at the movie’s helm, and while the characterization honestly and responsibly articulates Nicolas as the flawed and frenzied victim forced to confront his own unsettling truths, Golding appraises so much heart to the portrayal that you can’t help but invest in him, summoning his single best dramatic work to date, without sacrificing the warm Genuity that we’ve come to expect.
NEGATIVES
It took slightly longer than expected to invest myself in the storytelling alongside Nicolas’ plight, and the reason can especially be paid to a rushed opening act, which pits us immediately in the center of his tragic loss, without allowing us the opportunity to understand the meaning and magnitude that Daniela gave to him. At 108-minutes the film certainly has plenty of time to add a few scenes pertaining to the lighter and more prosperous side of this relationship before tragedy takes shape, but we’re asked immediately to care for people whom we’ve never met and have no experimental insight towards, so the stakes of Nicolas’ situation aren’t fully defined for around 30 to 40 minutes in the film, and it makes me wish we could’ve gotten to experience the tragedy in the film’s opening moments, as then we would know the extent of Nicolas’ personality shift. In addition to this some of the movie’s dialogue tries a bit too hard to explain some of the science heavy concepts associated with the plot, especially during the second act, alongside obvious visuals and clearly felt intentions that did more than enough to paint my coherence to what was transpiring during dream sequences. As to where the interactions between Nicolas and Daniela persist with clarity and conciseness, those unforeseen obstacles associated with the fantasy and reality worlds submerging with one another force Golding to speak directly to the audience, and it forces Vigalondo as a screenwriter to work overtime to how he conveys insight to the perception of the protagonist, surmising these unnatural lines of the character speaking to himself, for visuals that honestly aren’t as esoteric and metaphorical as the movie clearly thinks they are. Finally, the ending resolution left slightly more to be desired, especially in a character journey that abruptly shifts during the moments that it doesn’t feel as effectively earned. This is where I feel most opinions about the film will be tested the most by the audience, as the film’s closing moments are tied in a neatly convenient bow that not only sacrifices the urgency of a forthcoming situation, but also leaves Nicolas in a bit of an undefined situational circumstance that left me with more nagging questions than satisfying answers, all the while feeling like the particular moments when the film’s runtime finally starts to feel evidently influential on the duration of my patience.
OVERALL
“Daniela Forever” is a poignantly genuine and thought-provoking assessment to lost love that conveys there’s no future in living in the past. With an intimately heavy-hearted performance from Henry Golding, as well as visual storytelling as meaningfully complex and layered as any that I’ve seen this year, the film conjures another uniquely ambitious genre-blending exploit for Nacho Vigalondo, even with saccharine sentimentality and incoherent clarity that resolves the film on a bit of an unfulfilling note.
My Grade: 6.9 or C+