At first a seemingly drab film from drab Belgium. About a drab ordinary housewife living a drab everyday life. And then ginger Johnny – the bastard – comes along.He's bonked her in the boot with his big yellow truck. They curse one another. Then he smiles. Soon after he's ringing to offer to fix the boot. She invites him up for some burnt bloodwurst (sausage) (some very poor cuisine is going on in this film. I thought it was only us English who were supposed to cook rubbish food?!) They're off on a date. She drinks one glass of wine then wants to go. Viking Johnny is bonking her up in his big truck. "It was just this once" she says smiling. Then she finds out from twerpy arty flop-haired husband (who's left to go shack up with a student) that Johnnys an alcoholic, been to jail for beating up his ex-wife."I used you. Finito" she's saying. And yet she's being surprising sympathetic. Maybe she needs bad boy Johnny to recover her life (by rescuing him, that sorry schtick) Rom-coms have to come with big wallops of cynicism to be real enough to touch me. I like my love two thirds bitter to one third sweet. And while you're at it lets rub some salty sarcasm into any syrupy sentimentality that might be wallowing around. Matty is good at that. "You have to put mustard on everything. So you don't taste or feel anything" he's said to her. "You're talking drivel" she says. I like her. Like the actress who's playing her (Barbara Sarafian) She's attractive in an ordinary kind of way. Even when she's looking dreary something desirable occasionally flickers across her face from somewhere deep within.This film is getting to feel just about right enough for real life. The screenplay is immediate, the acting actual-to-life plausible; so engaging in fact you don't know you're reading subtitles anymore. I was believing in it.Matty and Johnny continue to throw little barbs of dry irony at one another. Humour is understated, not forced, appropriate to scene and situation. None of the characters play-act for laughs (from us, the audience) It's probably being even funnier in Flemish (if you spoke Flemish that is) Who's she gonna choose to be with? Is it flaky hubbie or fiery Johnny? Or would she be better off with neither of them? There's no "happy ever after" wrap up, but the ending is quite a few beats up from where the downbeat beginning had been. The dowdy old housewife is bouncing back home, her hair let loose and flying, a fresh sparkle returned to her eye.It seems Matty might have got her mojo back.

Moscow, Belgium starts out as an earnest and entertaining romance about a 41 year old mother of three and a 29 year old truck driver. So very much of the film is new, fresh, and funny. Too bad that it's sunk in the final 30 minutes by a false and intrusive theme about the oldest daughter suddenly being lesbian. This was obvious sucker-bait aimed at the liberal reviewers who usually give automatic positive reviews to any gay-themed film. Need one name names? Just as a cigarette butt or roach intrudes on a dinner plate, spoiling the remainder of the dinner, but also spoiling the portion already consumed, this amounts to a rude and shallow intrusion on the viewer's goodwill. When the mother gets the news that her daughter's boyfriend is "Iris" this very emotional woman responds not-at-all. Upon meeting Iris, we find, of course, that Iris is the nicest and most noble lesbian you'd ever want to meet -- planning a career of counseling terminally ill patients. There's more: The mother would never have let "a boy" sleep with her 16 year old daughter in their apartment, but since Iris is gay, her sleep-over is just fine.People are free to accept or reject Brokeback Mountain et cetera. That's fine, since they're up front about the gay theme. But when they take care to conceal it till you buy your ticket; well that's just not nice.

You can hardly get more unpretentious than what you have here.It's elementary clear how this is made, the devices that were used, and the effective it is and this is a good thing, in this case.Check how the story and the mood is built right from the first scene. A minor traffic accident in a parking lot, that begins an argument. The scene starts as a piece of ordinary life, goes on as a light word-based argument, and finishes in a funny mood. Notice how every word and sentence in this argument is designed to cause an immediate impression without becoming dark or even heavy. That's the mood of the film. It lives on daily lives, it introduces deviating elements, that usually work out funny (the introduction of the lesbian theme was a great moment, among others)and with this mood evokes a sense of tenderness, what audiences may call "romance". The fact that the people who conceived this were able to synthesize this so economically and efficiently in one single scene is really impressive. This is one of the most meaningful first scenes i've seen.I place this with 3 recent comedies that among many differences share a common sense of unpretentiousness, something that admits cinema is a piece of entertainment, that things have to be successful and effective in the eye, and through the dialogues, IN the world of the film, without meaning that the film should moralize or search for superior answers to common themes. These films i saw recently are "Juno", "Little miss Sunshine" and this one. Of the 3, this was the best, to me. It deviates from Hollywood canons even more than the other two, and that may be the reason.It works for the performances, acting, which were surprisingly direct and grasping. I know very few or nothing about Belgian (or equivalent) acting traditions, but i am guessing (may be wrong) that this is inserted in a longer tradition of acting with fluidity, what some may consider "natural" acting. I wouldn't dare to mistake this for "real" life, as i suppose many spectators will, but this is a really well shaped cartoon world. Representation, that's what this is... the guy goes often to Italy, and speaks Italian many times, a language that in some of its golden moments in art is meant to "sound" instead of really "mean".Some cityscapes of the small town of Moscow, Belgium, is great. There was a competent eye for the city here as well.My opinion: 4/5 (FantasPorto 2009)http://www.7eyes.wordpress.com

Do not we all sometimes dream about a magic event that romantically turns our life in the ideal direction? Aanrijding in Moscou is just that: a film starting with a remarkable daily event resulting in a fully believable romantic story.It instantly picks you up in the beginning and takes you on a road through love and life in Gent, steadily sustained by its dialect and its typical cuisine.It shows how normal people try to live a normal live (and let's be honest: does such a thing really exist?) and how passion, emotion and our past have their influence on our lives.I was very moved by the film and especially by a scene where Johnny and Matty have a seemingly unimportant conversation discussing and putting into place the meaning of Leonardo Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa".Yes, as the glimpses of an Italian framework showed to me the greatness of this Belgian masterpiece I am absolutely sure there is something in it for EVERYONE. Sit back and be moved!