Sometimes a minimum preparation before seeing a film just can’t hurt. That is the case with The Ornithologist, a most surprising kind of beast that follows the mishaps of a bird researcher only to immediately turn into the most at odds allegory to Faith, Christianity and Saint Anthony you can stumble on, as of lately.
Despite being surrealistically funny at times (two Japanese tourist ladies kidnap and try to neuter the guy / three Amazon style breast naked horse riding ladies shoot the guy / one piece of deaf young shepherd called Jesus turns the guy to gay) this piece of art film is frustrating as hell as well (for those of us who didn’t attend Sunday school and lack the Biblical references), and fails to overcome this handicap by at least tapping to our sub-conscience in any other way.
Compared to the proposals of Apichatpong Weerasethakul, where local mythical/religious themes are also used without our factual knowledge being required (because of the highly universal imagery and “ecstatic truth” summoned), Mr. Rodrigues plays the Artist’s card, but may loose us as partners in the game.
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