Really Surprised!

A Brilliant Conflict

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

Urzula Antoniak is someone who understands loneliness. She understands her emotions very well and knows how to express them in a way you can understand, even when a film uses mainly visually storytelling and minimal dialogue. I can say that after watching Nothing Personal and now Code Blue. It's a movie about a lonely nurse, Marian, who attaches herself to her patients because she has no one else to share with. And who better than the elderly, who can be seen to be in state more vulnerable than her. They need her help and when she gives them that help she feels useful. At one point she holds hands with an old man then euthanizes him. At another time when she tries to do the same, her the patient is frightened. It can't always work out the way she wishes. When out for a run she helps an old woman with her groceries;they go inside her home to talk and the woman somehow can tell by the look on Marian's face that she's a sad, lonely woman. This scene felt a bit forced because I can't imagine a stranger casually inviting her in and making that immediate observation about her. And is Marian, who has trouble with people, really going to walk in and start conversing with the old woman? Nonetheless, pretty much everyone in her life knows her situation. She's asked if she's married? If she has anyone? Which must be awkward for her to answer especially at her age. She, however is not the most easy person to sympathize with. From haggling over eighty cents at the market to witnessing a rape and doing nothing about it, her loneliness and isolation has probably made her less compassionate. And very lonely she must feel, for in one moment she takes the semen from a used condom she found on the ground and rubs it on her vagina. A scene that many may find disgusting, but I found poignant. The ending to this film is not one I enjoyed. It was rather disturbing. I mean, I understand how pitiful this woman is and I didn't need to see her in such a pathetic state. Despite my problems with it, this is a touching film about loneliness that I highly recommend.

What a crazy little film this was, working some of its magic in afterthought. Excuse me for making a wild connection, but this felt more like a giallo than a drama, though there are no knives, no black gloves or a far fetched denouement at the end.There ís a series of murders though, but we know 'whodunnit' and there is a certain progression there; the first death happens in an operating room and isn't a murder, but we do see the protagonist - a middle aged nurse, strangely (?) reminiscent of the redeemed Lucia de B. - taking a 'souvenir' from the dead patient. Then we see her connecting on her own with a patient, whom she later 'helps' die, and it looks like the patient is okay with that. Yet even later she wants to 'help' a patient again, but this one protests - to no avail, though he does wound her and this causes quite a panic with her. We also learn that she has stolen many things from patients before, but still it doesn't prove she killed them all; I would still say things are starting to (really) get out of hand at the beginning of the film. In between, she tries to live her life, but it consists of sad incidents wherein she never really connects with anyone - she witnesses a rape from afar, but does nothing, she follows a man (a neighbor) into a video store, but later he ends up stalking her, and so it goes on.The finale takes things up a notch and dóes in a way have that giallo-like denouement: the story had been playing with the notion of coincidence up until then, but the nurse and her neighbor meeting as friends of friends at a party is nothing short of over-the-top fateful. I won't reveal anything about the finale, except that even though I truly dislike the trend of putting in / out genitals for shock value, 'Code Blue' gets away with it, another strange, yet unrelated, coincidence...In short, this is a suspenseful thriller (with plenty elements of drama), much focussing on the mental and physical vortex of a person losing control of her life, who doesn't seem to have started out being a bad person. Not as ugly and good as Marina De Van's 'Dans Ma Peau', but close, and well worth the reference. And of course kudos to Bien de Moor for her powerful performance and Urszula Antoniak for making such a bold movie.A small 9 out 10.

Polish screenwriter and director Urszula Antoniak's second feature film which she also wrote, is a Dutch-Danish co-production based on a short story called "Woods" by Janeck Luter Lenartowicz and was produced by producers Arnold Heslenfeld, Frans van Gestel and Floor Onrust. It tells the story about a middle-aged nurse named Marian who lives in an apartment-block. Marian is wholeheartedly devoted to her dying patients, works out, spends some time with her friends, but is longing for intimacy and is infatuated with a neighbor she begins to follow. Though Marian's attraction towards this man she knows nothing about is increasing she doesn't contact him, but her life changes when they both witness a crime.With it's distinct urban milieu depictions and significantly foreboding atmosphere, this existentialistic and voyeuristic psychological drama draws an unsentimental, intimate and heartbreaking portrayal of a humane, bilateral and deeply afflicted woman who has given some much of her love to her patients that she is almost dying for a little bit of affection for herself. While notable for its brilliant low-keyed visuals and the subtle and precise directing by Urszula Antoniak, this tense, cold and brave artistic expression depicts a clinical and condensed study of character about solitude, guilt, death and love, which goes straight into the conflicted heart and soul of the enigmatic protagonist.This austere, unsettling, graphic, somewhat abstract and character-driven mystery about a lonely woman's internal scream for solace is impelled and reinforced by the astounding and emphatic acting performance, somewhat reminiscent of Isabelle Huppert's acting performance in Michael Haneke's "The Piano Teacher" (2001), by Belgian actress Bien de Moor in a diverse role and the understated supporting acting performance by German actor Lars Eidinger. An expressionistic, metaphoric and excruciating character portrayal of loneliness which gained the Golden Calf for Best Cinematography Jasper Wolf and Best Sound Design Jan Schermer at The Netherlands Film Festival in 2011.