[FILM]
EO
Sad-ass: EO goes his own way.
★★★★★
OUT 3 FEBRUARY / CERT TBC / 86 MINS
DIRECTOR Jerzy Skolimowski
CAST Hola, Tako, Marietta, Ettore, Rocco and Mela (donkeys)
PLOT When the Polish circus he works for abruptly closes down, lovely little donkey EO finds himself unmoored, drifting across the land, moving from person to person as he is bought, sold, lost and injured. Along the way he encounters an eclectic array of humans — and experiences different aspects of humanity.
JERZY SKOLIMOWSKI HAS never been the conventional sort. Having made his name as part of the Polish New Wave scene in the 1960s, he directed some arresting British dramas in the 1970s and ’80s, and in 2010 cast Vincent Gallo as, somehow, a Taliban fighter in survivalist thriller Essential Killing. Meanwhile, he’s dabbled in acting — one of his last gigs had him being headbutted by Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow in 2012’s Avengers Assemble. He is predictably unpredictable, so it makes sense that his latest film is a trippy, 86-minute odyssey following a donkey across Poland. EO is very loosely inspired by Robert Bresson’s Au Hasard Balthazar, but concept aside, this is maximum Skolimowski. And maximum donkey.