I won’t purport to be an expert but, compared to the millennia preceding us, it’s hard to imagine another period of human history that’s seen so much change than the past century.  I speak of population growth, advances in technology, the changing environment, shifts in societal values, workforce participation, and medical discoveries.  The world is moving at a rapid pace – both physically through the galaxy and metaphorically here on Earth.

Hungarian director Ildikó Enyedi is best known for her 2017 feature Of Body and Soul which won the Golden Bear (the top gong) at the Berlin Film Festival and earned an Academy Award nomination for best foreign language film (losing to A Fantastic Woman).  She taps into the above themes with her latest outing, Silent Friend.  It won’t be for everyone with its slow-paced, reflective approach but for lovers of “different” cinema, it will hopefully connect.

Silent Friend consists of three short stories interwoven across 147 minutes.  The first is set in 1908 and looks at an intelligent woman trying to become the first female to study botany at a prestigious German university.  The second is set in 1972 and is centred on two carefree, plant-loving youngsters with a fleeting romantic connection.  The third is set in 2020 and follows an academic neurologist whose research and travel is interrupted by the impacts of COVID-19.

These tales illustrate the world’s transformation but so too does Enyedi with her filmmaking techniques.  The 1908 era subplot is shot in black-and-white using 35mm celluloid film, the 1972 era story uses 16mm colour film, while the 2020 era is depicted through digital cameras available to us all today.  This approach helps differentiate the three narratives and helps create a distinct vibe for each.

Despite all the “change” alluded to, the key premise of Silent Friend is the way this contrasts with nature which moves at a much slower pace.  The connecting element of the short stories is a large ginkgo tree which has sat, largely unchanged, in the same location for centuries.  If it could talk (and don’t worry, it doesn’t), it could tell a myriad of anecdotes of the people who walked past or sat under its huge branches.  It brought back memories of the opening monologue in last year’s Sentimental Value which thinks of how an old house, another long-standing immovable object, perceives the biosphere around it.

The individual yarns weren’t interesting enough for me.  I’d have preferred a faster pace and more drama.  Still, I can admire Silent Friend for its ambition and having us ruminate on nature and society.