Spine 620: La promesse

Lost in Criterion

Our introduction to the films of Belgian brothers Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne, La promesse (1996) is, like last week's Le Havre, a story of African migrants in Europe. But where Aki Kaurismäki took a more magical approach, the Dardenne's hew much closer to the intense realism of, say, Ken Loach. The brothers' history in documentary perhaps make it even more intense than what Loach we've seen. It's a story of rejecting what you've been told is the order the world must work in, and finding the community and care that your heart cries out for. A better world may be illegal, but it remains possible.