Saturday''s Lo que sé de Lola / Co vím o Lole (Spain,2006) tested the boundaries of the question. In film, where do the limits of "art" lie? On the scale from Blockbuster to poetic yet slightly sentimental popular films (vis. Amélie ) to well balanced, intelligent, poetic, and yet absolutely watchable, entertaining films such as Adaptation, or my first two films of the festival, Mister Lonely, and Ye-ui-up-nun-gut-deul , at last at the other end of the scale is a film like Lola.

In his introduction to the film, the director Javier Rebollo said that he did not like to talk about his creative work, that rather we should see the film ourselves, let the images sink in, and have their effect on us. The primary word in his sentence was images . His film is, taking influence from eastern films such as Takeshis, and many other Korean, Japanese films, that are constructed from shots that seem to be static images. But in those films, the thing is, they still have some movement, there is a Reason why the film is a movie, with movement, and not, as Lola could have been, merely a photo album of still photos.

The unfortunate thing about Rebollo's film is that one can see his intentions. It is clear that this slow and at times absolutely static pace is meant to express the stillness of the characters' lives. Rebollo wants to depict monotonous, depressing and painful lives. But all he succeeds in doing is making a monotonous, depressing, and painful film.

The film's beginning is filled with repetitive shots (maybe they are even reused?) as Léon, the main character, goes about taking care of his sick mother. He goes up in the lift, he goes down. Every time he enters his mother's room, the door opens to exactly the same angle, and then we see his freckled nose poke past it. These repetitive shots are clearly meant to lull us into some sort of trance, to feel the pace of his life as he does. As he says, "Je me suis habitué..." - I have gotten used to it. After this, the death of his mother and subsequent arrival of Lola, his failing and flailing Spanish neighbour, is clearly supposed to seem like some sort of shock. Or at least a change.

In fact, the film maintains its snail pace, so that events take on no particular meaning. They are simply continuing in the same way, that is consistent in their emotional stuntedness. Léon has switched from taking care of his mother to voyeuristically watching Lola from afar, even driving with her all the way, supposedly without her noticing, from Paris to La Mancha. But the pace is the same, the narration is the same. The colours are still the same - ever primary but ever faded. The film fails, because they are never raised from their monotony, and neither the characters nor the director seem to want them to be.

When a film feels ponderous and seems to drag, it is because something is missing. There are plenty of slow, meditative, delicate films that still are moving and interesting. This one is not, because that something that should be in the air is lacking. There is no emotion, the characters do not evoke sympathy. From time to time, there are vague and gentle attempts at humour, such as Léon dancing to the music of Lola's Christmas tree. But these things do not add anything and only feel awkward. And that is, not in a way that adds anything, because there is no saracasm in it. There is no grotesque, there is only superfluousness.

Rebollo has failed because he has apparently failed to consider, or perhaps misjudged, his audience. A film is nothing without an audience, and this film does nothing to capture the emotions of the spectator. By the time the film was over the room had half emptied. And this was because this film is not really watchable. It failed to engage the audience, because it is not alive, but rather hung before us drably. Too concerned with the art of it, it lost touch with real life.