The Pink Cloud

🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿 *review starts @ 28:59

🎙️ EPISODE 644: 02.14.23 I think, having lived through an actual pandemic, I was much more critical of some of the minute, strictly logistical details in what is otherwise a pretty spectacular (and eerily prescient) film. COVID obviously changed everybody. It's fascinating to see how this would have played before or without it, really. But it isn't really fair to think about that. This tells the story of a couple in Brazil whom, after first meeting and sleeping together, wake up the next day and immediately are subjected to a super pandemic, in the form of low-hanging pink clouds/mist... that kill you within 10 seconds if you directly inhale their gas. Somehow, this poison doesn't seep through the cracks in the windows and doors, and that's briefly addressed. Trust me, this film is gonna work so much better if you can try to ignore all of the pragmatic and explicitly scientific stuff.

This was REALLY difficult for me, and I'll explain why, but in hindsight I've come to see that all of that junk has no real bearing on the emotional and extremely human weight here. This is a moody and atmospheric picture. There's no real, concrete indicator of the passing of time and this is to the film's benefit. It accurately establishes the feeling like you are apart from time, like how COVID felt. She ends up getting pregnant and having a baby with this man who was a stranger the day before the pink cloud arrived. It just happens, even though she said she never wanted to. Because of boredom, because of feeling insignificant in this new world? Who knows. The baby is born with a FaceTime or Zoom doctor and it grows up to be a kid. We move along the arrow of time with this trio now. No indication of what year it is or what year it was because it doesn't matter.

To solve the very simple question of "how do people who literally cannot leave their home get food" we have: drones which build tubes connected to a window with cellophane shoots (we only see them delivering things once; don't worry about the installation!). This is a science-fiction film, so that's fine. We don't know if this several decades into the future. Sure, maybe governments around the world could do this? Where it stretches thin is when they keep talking about ordering things and sending them through the tubes, unnecessary things like a cheap-looking nightlight you might mindlessly purchase on Amazon. But who is in charge of all this manufacturing let alone all the crucial farming and food production? How are the poorest people getting by? This is never explained. It's literally just a logistical problem which doesn't detract from the overall point of the film — a deep and really thoughtful examination of human connection in a world ever so increasingly consumed by technology — but it's a big issue. I felt that needed to get flushed out a little more in some way.

Nevertheless, I really enjoyed The Pink Cloud and highly recommend it. It's wonderfully paced and acted, a high 8/10 for me. Easily the best "pink" movie I've seen this year.

CHRONOLOGICALLY
⫷ EPISODE 644B - (YOU ARE HERE) - EPISODE 645 ⫸

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The Pink Cloud (Portuguese: A Nuvem Rosa) is a 2021 Brazilian science fiction thriller film written and directed by Iuli Gerbase in her directional debut. The setting of the story in the film has been compared to the COVID-19 pandemic, although written and directed earlier, in 2017 and 2019 respectively. The film stars Renata de Lélis, Eduardo Mendonça, Kaya Rodrigues, Helena Becker, and Girley Paes. It was released on January 29, 2021.