The Farewell Party gives reverence to death

There is dignity in death and The Farewell Party searches for it in humorous bursts of empathy. 

It begins with an elderly tinkerer ringing up an older woman. “This is God,” he says, and the woman, senile and confused, believes him. “You are certainly going to heaven, but we have no vacancies, so you must get your treatment.” The woman nods. 

At this point you realize you’re in for for something very unique, and likely heartbreaking. 

The tinkerer is Yehezkel (Ze’ev Recach) and he is watching his best friend suffer in pain in a care facility. His prognosis is terminal. Morphine no longer works, and he’s developing bedsores that are increasingly painful. His wife, at the end of her rope, suggests they end his agony and the gears in Yehezkel’s head begin spinning. 

What happens next is a devastating examination of mercy as Yehezkel and his band of helpers plan, build and implement a euthanasia machine. The device is crude -- it is driven by a small motor and a bicycle chain, and uses drugs intended for animals -- but it is effective at ending the suffering of Yehezkel’s “patients,” who seek him out at great risk for themselves and their loved ones.

The Farewell Party handles all this in a serious way, but you can’t help but smile at its subtle brand of bleak comedy, from the gay man literally trapped in the closet and an overzealous traffic cop repeatedly talked out of writing tickets, to a touching scene with much of the elderly cast nude and high in a greenhouse to cheer up a friend with dementia. The gallows humor manages to give brief reprieves between each heartbreaking death. 

The Israeli film, directed by Tal Granit and Sharon Maymon, is beautifully staged and photographed. The camera almost never moves, preferring instead static shots that give the scenes and their terrifying implications reverence. When it does move, in a lovely musical number and later in a tragic moment of realization for Yehezkel, it does so to punctuate the delicate nature of life and death.

It ends precisely where you want it to, but it stings even as it rings true. This is a beautiful film, one that gazes long and hard into the soul of the dying, and those who look over them.

Surrealist Mood Indigo dazzles, then fizzles

Part quirky comedy, part Salvador Dalí surrealist fantasy, part Dr. Seuss dreamscape, Mood Indigo is probably best described by its scenarios, which are oddly fascinating, not to mention utterly baffling:

• A man takes a bath in purple water. When he's done he uses a power tool to drill through the bottom of the tub and the ceiling of the tenant below him. The grape-colored water drains through the holes into a flower pot, which then instantly sprouts a full-grown flower.

• Eels peek out of a kitchen faucet until a chef can grab them and prepare the squirmy little creatures for dinner. After dinner is prepared, the dishes spin and dance around the prep table until they can be carried to a wavy wooden dinner table with roller skates on the legs.

• Rows of typists frantically hammering on typewriters being moved down the line on conveyor belts. The text they're typing seems to be the thoughts and actions of the main character, who later, inexplicably, takes a job in the facility that likely represents his own brain.

• A device called a pianocktail works like mechanized bartender attached to a piano. As the keys are played — minor keys for more nostalgic drinks, major keys for more optimistic drinks — a little train carrying a glass circles the piano adding ingredients to the musically derived cocktail.

• A man uses a Rubik's Cube as a day planner. When asked about a day later in the week, he twists the sides until they line up for the day he's planning.

• When characters shake hands, their entire hands rotate at the wrist several revolutions.

• At a party someone brings out "oven-baked snacks," which are flaky pastries individually baked in miniature ovens.

• The bride and groom at a wedding are determined by an obstacle course involving boxcar racers with cross-shaped wheels. And the preacher arrives by parachuting out of an iron rocket that circles the inside of the church's cathedral.

• At an office building, a man passes a memo by crumpling it up, loading it into a large revolver and firing it into a tube that snakes through the building. 

• When someone dies and their family can't afford a proper funeral, workers come to the house and remove the body by throwing the casket out the window. It's taken to the cemetery not by hearse, but by a delivery truck that belches smoke and soot. 

• Two characters ride in a street-side amusement attraction, a fiberglass cloud hoisted up by a giant crane that can reach across all of France.

• A tiny mouse, played by a man in rodent costume, wanders throughout many scenes, including inside the kitchen, where he silently fetches items for the chef. 

The french movie is certainly eccentric, and I've only scratched the surface on its odd scenes. It’s directed by Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind director Michel Gondry, because of course it is. Although it sounds too arty and symbolic for a plot, it does have one: Colin (Romain Duris) meets and falls in love with Chloé (Audrey Tautou, Amélie), named after his favorite Duke Ellington song. Deep into their relationship, she develops a water lily in her lung that cripples her and requires Colin to jump into gear to save her life. 

Mood Indigo starts out pleasant enough, but doom and dread slowly creep into the whimsical mixture. This turn is gradual at first as the music switches keys and grows more ominous, then the shots get slow and steadier, and finally the color is sucked from the frame until the film ends in black and white. I wasn't ready for the sudden depression, but then again I wasn't ready for any of it.

While unique and visually fascinating, the film is hollow and lacks humanity and compassion. This is not the first time Gondry has out-dreamed his vision — recall the sad disappointment of Be Kind Rewind — but it's likely to be his most ambitiously visual picture, which is its own reward, great film or not.