EO World Cinema

In Polish auteur Jerzy Skolimowski’s playful tribute to Robert Bresson’s 1966 AU HASARD BALTHAZAR, we experience the kindness and the cruelty of the human world through the melancholic eyes of a donkey. A carnival donkey bonds with a young performer (Sandra Dryzmalska), but is separated from her, when animal rights legislation delivers the braying protagonist to a horse retreat, from which a quiet escape sets off a series of adventures. The beast of burden set free into the world soon finds itself at the mercy of its human inhabitants, passing from person to person. By chance the donkey is briefly appointed soccer mascot, then sent to a salami factory, and somehow falls into the care of an eccentric aristocrat (Isabelle Huppert). Cowritten and produced with Ewa Piaskowska (co-writer FOUR NIGHTS WITH ANNA), EO is thrilling, confounding and not without humor. Its minimalistic tale is extravagantly and expressionistically conveyed through astoundingly beautiful cinematography and a lush soundscape, deservedly earning it the shared Jury Prize at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. –Malin Kan