Fest Track On Sirk TV Film Review: DANIELA FOREVER [Toronto Intl Film Festival 2024 - Toronto, Ontario]
The idea of control continues to permeate the thematics of certain films at this year’s TIFF. But with “Daniela Forever” [Platform/World Premiere] it is based on the internal. Henry Golding who played an almost reverse role in “Last Christmas” with Emilia Clarke (which didn’t quite hit with audiences) hits the reverse again here with a character facing a loss of his own. There is the same yearning of the previously mentioned film without the other concept and underlying music aspects that might have hindered “Last Christmas.” But even that film had these great moments where happiness was very close by but just out of reach One scene in that film with Golding’s head lying in Clarke’s lap really brought it to bear. Here the whole concept is Nicolas (Golding) dealing with grief at losing Daniela (Beatrice Granno) of “The White Lotus.” The concept of the film involves lucid dreaming but it moves a little further than that.
The film is from Nacho Vigalondo who made “Colossal” which is another interesting play on perspective. Here aspects of light, dark and gray se part of the thematics also as is medium and not just character. The way the film is built as a genre film is an exercise but still an engaging and entertaining one because of its two leads. Granno is a blank canvas in many ways but a mix between Brittany Murphy and Audrey Tatou. The only off putting aspect is her lack of dimensionality at the beginning of Golding’s backward journey which is eventually restored. The reasoning of it makes sense which balances back to control. Golding’s hubris as a character is what creates the backlog. The reality of it that grates a little is that the people that are watching him in this would-be experiment should know from his reports that he is lying. As the medium structures blend, the sense of the film becomes a little less defined, which “Colossal” did too but the metaphor works here better than the actual truth which is that nothing means nothing…until it does. B
By Tim Wassberg
