I recently reviewed Beowulf and Grendel. It had a renowned Canadian actress named Sarah Polley. I had never seen her before (to my knowledge) but something about her performance, as a seductive loner witch, intrigued me enough to look up her work on IMdb. It seems she was in a film that was recommended to me recently by a good friend. The movie has the ubiquitous arthouse-sounding title 'The Secret Life of Words' which also stars Tim Robbins (who I tend to enjoy). Hmmm....

Upon further investigation it turns out that Miss Polley (actually 'Mrs.' - I see she's married - dang) often rejects large commercial roles in support of what she deems as more 'meaningful' cinema. Bravo - this type of discerning performer is rare indeed to find in the mainstream circles of modern film production where mercenaries follow cash. Aside from some limitations with her eastern-block accent she is nothing short of captivatingly stellar in this film.

Who is the director? - It seems this is not the first collaboration for Spanish writer-director Isabel Coixet and Canadian actress Sarah Polley. They also were in My Life Without Me from 2003 that won Polley her third Best Actress Genie (Canadian film performance award). The often 'brilliant' Almovodar bothers produced 'The Secret Life of Words'. But I entered my viewing without any of this knowledge.

Evolving like the work of master realist Eric Rohmer we are presented with a very sedate story of mysterious, and obviously wounded, individuals - the physical, for both, juxtaposing the psychological. These are, refreshingly, not glamorous people - not rich people - not gun toting people. Hanna (Sarah Polley), is a deaf Balkan refugee who has been quietly working at a silk plant in England for the past four years without taking a single sick day or any holiday vacations. She eats the same thing every day - chicken, rice and an apple. Yes... we are curious. One day she is more-than-gently persuaded by her boss to take a month off inferring that her excessive competence makes other, less fiduciary-minded, employees 'uncomfortable'.

We begin to learn important details through subtle inference - for example; she was once a nurse. This leads her to utilize her time off by agreeing to medically tend to Josef (Tim Robbins) who has had a severe accident on an oil rig (where he is bedridden) - sporting serious contusions and excruciating burns. Complexities arise from these simplistic circumstances and we, at a deliberate pace, find details about our damaged protagonists. They have valid reasons to be closed off. So life, and the narrative, transpires...

The film is nothing short of a masterpiece infusing symbols involving emotional distancing (the oil rig is essentially barren of employees after the fire). Communication is limited between all characters and correspondingly Hanna is totally deaf without the use of her hearing aid. Even the most gregarious persona, the oil rig chef, played by Javier Cámara, is relegated to minor character status. The effective cinematography bears witness to the intensity of Hanna and Josef's inner demons with constant close-up and frequent hand-held modulations. Even the dim lit room of her soul-purging to him. The film is a beautiful dissertation on being human - surviving, coping, opening up, reaching out and moving forward. This is one of the better films I have seen this year. Highly recommended!

Gary Tooze