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Maloin leads a simple life without prospects, at the edge of the infinite sea; he barely notices the world around him, has already accepted the slow and inevitable deterioration of life around him and his all but complete loneliness. When he witnesses a murder, his life takes a sudden turn. He comes face to face with issues of morality, sin, punishment, the line between innocence and complicity in crime, and this state of skepticism leads him to the ontological question of the meaning and worth of existence. (CinEast)
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Like all of Béla Tarr's previous films, The Man from London is anchored in the director's exceptional stylistic vision, while the subject of interest for the narrator, and thus also for the viewer, is not the story, but rather the structurally precise composition of shots, the spirituality surrounding the world of the main characters, and the temporal construction of each scene. In a film with detective elements, where the central event is a murder and the only witness is at the centre of the narrative, the tension is not created by anticipating the murder (it takes place in the opening minutes) or moving towards its investigation; rather, each shot is suspenseful, beginning slowly, then coming to its key message, and then fading freely again, even though the action has already ended. The film thus perfectly reflects the loneliness of the main anti-hero, working on a deserted harbour dock, showing his inner dilemma of what to do with the money left at the crime scene and helping the viewer acclimatise to the bleak environment and accept the created world as realistic. And as far as Miroslav Krobot is concerned, his performance is precise and in a way captivating, I wish him more opportunities like this.
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Miroslav Krobot is fully displaying his minimalist acting, which slightly reminds me of Mr. Hrušínský. A single glance, the movement of a single facial muscle, and you can immediately read everything from his face. But even Krobot doesn't act in a film that only proves to me that Tarr will not be my cup of film reel.
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