Ikuisuus ja päivä

"An Eternity and a Day", as the title translated in English means, is the answer Alexandros -the film's hero- receives as an epiphany, while pondering on the meaning of Tomorrow.

We surmise that he has only a few days left to live, and watch him face a dilemma: should he choose to give some meaning to the rest of his life, learn to love, care and express himself to the people he's in close contact with; or wither away, a stranger in his own life only to die a pointless death?

Contrary to popular opinion, the film's concept is really this simple.

Theo Angelopoulos has managed to win the appraisal of many, at the same time obtaining a hateful opposition. And while there are sequences in the film which will have you rolling your eyes and proclaiming "Get on with it!", it's unique pictorial beauty and lyricism will more than make up for the lack of movement.

Some of the downsides are the director's constant moulding of the world (and a strange one it is, where an 8 year old boy can debate like an adult and everyone spouts poetry instead of words) to fit his own megalomaniacal impulses - but maybe that's not a sin after all, maybe that's just what Creation is all about...

A deserved 7.