Invisible Life

The plot eventually loses pathos. Before then, however, it reaches its high point in a wonderfully staged moment of "so near yet so far".

The screenplay, adapted by Murilo Hauser, Inés Bortagaray and director Karim Aïnouz, is expertly calibrated. They don't often make them like this any more.

The movie is saturated with emotion and colour, though its novelistic depth brings with it the slightly effortful running time of two hours and 20 minutes.

Hélène Louvart's beautiful and evocative cinematography adds much to the melodrama. The colors are vibrant and the frame shifts are seamless.

Invisible Life is constructed on heightened emotional intensity in an everyday domestic milieu, with discreet touches of narrative contrivance playing their part--

Let's just say there's closure: It isn't shocking, but rather a heartbreaking one - a bookend to the long, sad story that delivers, in contrast to all the dismal developments that have come before it, a kind of bittersweet satisfaction.

There’s not a single second wasted in a story which is not just about the strength of family bonds, but also doubles as an indictment of old-fashioned gender stereotypes.

As great as the rest of the film is, it’s that final sequence that lifts it to potential all-timer status, pulling all the story threads together in an unexpected way to reach a crescendo of emotions that only the best melodramas can reach.

Gorgeously filmed in rich, deep colours and infused with even stronger emotions.

Brazilian-born filmmaker Karim Aïnouz adapts Martha Batalha's 2016 novel of the same name into a sumptuous and moving melodrama.