Apples

I don't often like cinematic riddles, but this one deserves putting the effort to try and solve it. Especially since the movie itself gives us all the necessary clues for the solution.

The more I thought about this film the better I realized it was. It asks two basic questions what's our memories made of? And, how do we build new ones if we lost all those we had?

Yes, it's funny at moments, but I don't think it's a comedy and I said more than once on this pages "comedy drama" or "tragic comedy" are non terms as far as I'm concerned. Life have their funny moments, and showing these funny moments doesn't mean we're telling a funny story. In fact most of the laughs in this movie come from the artificial attempt to create new memories for these people who lost their old memories so they can build a new personality. It's like constructing a personality in a laboratory - that's not the way to do it. Personality is what carries us through real life and that's the only place where personalities can be built.

The film says this very loudly with a story that allows us very limited information about its protagonist. Aris, the protagonist seems to suffer from the amnesia sickness that the story tells us, is taking place all over the world. But we'll soon realize Aris does remember certain things, but doesn't like remembering. We'll have to reach the very end of the movie to solve its riddle and pay close attention to the clues provided through the story to find why Aris stopped fearing apples which are - as the film says - "good for the memory"

I won't be saying anything more, as this would mean adding a spoiler - I don't do these.

Christos Nikou's debut film is a fitting entry to the Greek Weird Wave, following its canons yet curiously introspective in a genuine way. The city is under attack by a curious pandemic of amnesia: tens of thousands suddenly forget everything about their past life. So seems to happen to the main character, found on a bus without documents and hence unidentifiable. Since nobody comes to look for him and identify him, he is enrolled in a program that aims at giving new identities to unidentified people. The film is obviously about how memories shape an identity, but this is tackled in a most unexpected way even knowing the premise of the film. It is suggested that the main character seems to remember things from his old life, but it may be because of the titular apples he keeps eating contonuously, which are told to have the power to bring back memories. In the tradition estabilished by Lanthymos (whom Nikou assisted in Dogtooth), the scenes are austere and dry, yet there is room for the interior journey of the main character, around which the film is constructed, allowing not so much an introspective look, but rather a very close view (additionally, the narrowness of the narrative is paralleled by the 4:3 aspect ratio). It's a debut film, and it is not flawless, one can argue that the analysis on the effects of memory loss and identity loss are not deep enough, but Nikou has been able to convey a double-effect of apparent introspectiveness, yet distanced look, which I found interesting enough to be interested in future projects by him.

In this film Aris appears to have suffered from a major case of amnesia, along with many of his fellow citizens. As a result he is put into a rehabilitation program, to try to help him rebuild his identity. The central character plays the scenes with a deadpan air, allowing us to view the unfolding events with him. He meets a fellow amnesiac, and they appear to be building a relationship, but he becomes disillusioned when he realises that her advances towards him are just the result of suggestions by the doctors who are controlling the program. It is an interesting study about the search for identity, and a meaning to life, and perhaps too the controlling impact of institutions on our lives, as the demands of the doctors become increasingly bizarre and inappropriate. Ultimately the film seems to question whether the character really has lost his memory, or whether this is a voluntary choice, as he searches for a new identity.

A dash of Philip K. Dick & Julio Cortazar (Disturbed Memory Department of the Neurological Hospital) and lots of Greek Weird Wave clichés - deadpan humor, doom and gloom, alienation, grief, identity-crisis, ennui etc. Alas, Apples lacks the haunting sadism of Lanthimos and Makridis' films which could make it more palatable to a wider audience. Nikou's suggestion - amnesia is not a disease, but a cure - is intriguing.

Even though there were a few absurdities, it was very well made in general. It's a very easy going and entertaining movie.