06/03/2002 Entry:
"Late Marriage - Dover Koshashvili (2001)"

Ah Summer, when a young man's fancy turns to baseball and parking at The Music Box becomes impossible even for an early afternoon show. Time to dig out the bike.

Of the new releases I've seen this year (all five of them,) this is by far the best. The key to this film, for me, is the scene where ZaZa pueposely unlocks Judith's door despite the fact that he knows his parents are downstairs waiting. To what end is he doing this, what is he trying to accomplish? At first I figured he was springing some sort of trap on his parents, but obviously this was not the case and our whole perception of him changes here because of wht he did before. That whole portion of the film is really gripping, and it wouldn't be nearly as much so without that touch. It is to credit of Dover Koshashvili that ZaZa's motives in this case and others are left unsaid, rather than turning this into a political statement as most directors would in a film about arranged marriage. The ambiguity is a very large part of what makes this film so good.

Much has been made of the "most realistic sex scene ever filmed." On my way home I was considering what makes this scene so touching, and its really the familiarity of the characters with each other. Their comfort level is perfect. It helps that Koshashvili films them in the most natural way possible, without using the typical Hollywood sex scene move of positioning the camera so as not to show anything below the belt. My god, male nudity! In a sex scene! The whole scene is just scripted, directed and acted perfectly.

I also noticed many writers mentioning the Georgian heritage of the characters. I must have been asleep at the wheel or something, because I don't remember that EVER being mentioned in the film. Was this just in the press kits, or was this actually alluded to at some point? I spent a lot of the early portion of the film trying to figure out their heritage. I knew they were in Tel Aviv, so I figured they were Israeli, even though they didn't look Israeli and I didn't think that arranged marriage was an Israeli custom.

Replies: 2 comments

I've been wanting to see this one since hearing about from D'Angelo and other online critics on the Cinemasters mailing list. I wonder if it will make it to New Orleans. I doubt it. Posted by Scott @ 06/18/2002 03:01 PM CST

Late Marriage didn't make it to New Orleans? I'm kind of surprised, I thought it was pretty well distributed, and I figured New Orleans would have a decent number of art/indie theatres. Is that not true? Whats the situation like there for smaller films? Posted by Greg Dunlap @ 06/18/2002 03:06 PM CST