Orlando

Based on a somewhat controversial novel, it tackles gender issues and other deep subjects quite well.

Orlando is perhaps one of the most interesting and controversial novels by the equally controversial Virginia Woolf. The details of this writer's life are known: the sexual abuse she suffered in childhood, the depressive crises, the existential doubts she experienced all her life, her bisexuality. And Orlando was born in this context: it is the result of the relationship between Woolf and Victoria Sackville West, an aristocrat who maintained an open marriage, in which she could live her sexuality with other women. To what extent have Victoria or the author herself, at certain moments, not wanted or fantasized about an eventual sex ch...

Tilda Swinton is superb in this story of the eponymous Tudor noble who obeys a command from the enamoured Queen Elizabeth (Quentin Crisp) and refuses to grow old. The film now follows the adventures, loves and ultimately depicts how the character adapts - quite literally - as England becomes Britain and eventually he becomes free! The experiences as an ambassador in the middle east, the determination to retain the family property when the authorities begin to smell a rat, the arrival of a child - all build upon this wonderfully enigmatic Virginia Woolf creation that defies typical analysis. This is story of humanity and of it's own reluctance to embrace meaningful change as events and the environment relentlessly changes around it. Historic...