Quickcard Review Sleepwalking Land (Terra Sonambula)

Directed by:  Teresa Prata Cast:  Nick Lauro Teresa, Aladino Jasse, Helio Fumo Running Time:  1 hr 35 mins Rating: Not Rated Release Date:  December 18, 2009

PLOT: A boy with no memory, and the man who found him travel around Mozambique as refugees searching for food. Muidinga (Teresa) finds a journal belonging to Kindzu (Fumo) which he hopes will lead him to his forgotten family.

WHO'S IT FOR? Mature fans of international cinema.  Though the film stars a child it definitely isn't for kids.

OVERALL

Sleepwalking Land defies easy description.  A unique film that blends magical realism with a gritty narrative, it's the story of Muidinga, a child who lost his memory after a serious illness and Tuahir (Jasse), the man who found and saved him.  The opening scenes resemble the recent film The Road as the two wander down a path, hiding from a gang and finding shelter in a burned out bus still containing the bodies of its passengers.  There Muidinga finds a journal telling a man's story of war and love and the boy he was searching for.  Muidinga believes he is the boy being sought in the story, and the two narratives intersperse as man and boy travel during the day and read the journal at night.  There's a laissez-faire attitude toward reality at times, rivers are formed from digging in the ground, but there are also very tense, violent moments such as when Kindzu returns home only to find something horrific waiting for him.

Though most of the movie was enjoyable, there are some very weird moments.  Maybe it was a cultural thing, but there's a particular scene that plays as a friendly father/son type moment but is deeply disturbing and would count as child abuse in most countries, probably including Mozambique.  If you can let that go, which was admittedly difficult for me, the rest of the movie is pretty good.  Compared to many foreign movies, this film requires the viewer to put cultural assumptions at the door and just watch and accept.  If you can do that, you may enjoy this film.  But I have a hard time whole-heartedly recommending it.

FINAL SCORE: 5/10