Mother & Son is a stunningly perfectionist yet tremendously moving piece of art. The plot as it is revolves around a son tending to his dying mother in a rural Russian setting.
Whilst this situation is itself moving, the primary impact of the film is sensual. Sokurov goes to immense trouble to turn every extended take into a mesmerising image worthy in-itself, using intricate filters and in-camera techniques to create a stunningly original visual landscape. The dolby soundtrack is just as complex, mixing natural ambient recordings, sparse but precise dialog and occasional snippets of classical music mixed in at a nearly inaudible level. The soundtrack itself could stand alone.
More importantly, perhaps, the style fits the subject matter. What Sokurov essentially does is kills the audience - the film has an immense hypnotic power that places the audience directly inside the gaze of the dying woman. Both times I saw this film, the entire audience was left sitting dazed and motionless for a number of minutes after the house lights had come up.
The final triumph is the films short running time of 1 hr 15 minutes. The audience is given no time to lose concentration, and the film achieves all its goals in this time.
Mother & Son must rank as one of the few recent films to qualify as a truly cinematic experience.
